Fork in the Road
by chocolatequeen
Summary: After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?
1. Chapter 1

Title: Fork in the Road

Author: Chocolatequeen

Rating: K 

Summary: AU Sam/Jack. "For every possible universe, there are an infinite number of variations, diverging at every choice we make like forks in a road." _AlterSam, Point of View._ After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?

**Chapter One: Two Roads Diverged**

"_When you come to a fork in the road, take it." Yogi Berra_

"Because I care about her—a lot more than I'm supposed to." Jack's words echoed so loudly in Sam's mind that she barely caught Anise's declaration that he was not a za'tarc.

"Now retest me," she ordered, moving to take Jack's place. She quickly and efficiently released the bands holding him in the chair and switched places with him. Once he'd strapped her in, she studiously avoided looking at him, focusing her attention instead on Anise.

Taking that as a sign to begin, Anise began her new line of questioning. "Major Carter, how did you feel when you realized you were trapped on the opposite side of the force shield from Colonel O'Neill?"

"I was relieved," she said without hesitation. "He was free, he could get out before the explosives went off."

"When it became clear he had no intention of leaving you, what did you do?"

"I tried to get him to leave, but he wouldn't." She took a deep breath, remembering exactly what had happened. The machine wanted details and she would give it details. "I told him there wasn't time, that he needed to go, but he just kept fighting with the force shield."

"And time was running out," Anise prompted.

Her words reawakened the panic she'd felt when she realized Jack wouldn't leave her--she could almost hear the hum of the force shield, so strong was the emotion. "I told him to go, but... he finally looked at me, and that's when I knew."

Even as lost as she was in her memories, Sam felt the tension in the room ratchet up a few notches. "When you knew what?"

"When I knew why he wouldn't leave me. I knew I couldn't ask him to, because I knew if our positions were reversed, I wouldn't have left him either." She stopped, hoping she wouldn't have to divulge anything else about her feelings for her commanding officer.

Anise glanced down at the display and frowned almost imperceptibly. "Why is that?" she prodded, and Sam knew there was no getting around it.

"Because," she answered, looking at Jack for the first time since she'd sat down, "I care about him too--a lot more than I'm supposed to."

Once again, the words were so powerful that she almost missed hearing the Tok'ra clear her. "Thank you," she said. Jack was moving toward her before the words were out of her mouth, and his presence in her personal space so soon after their mutual admissions was almost too much for her. The last few minutes had torn down all the walls she'd built around her feelings for him, and she desperately needed time alone to rebuild them.

"Carter," he said quietly as he undid the last strap. He moved into a corner of the room, giving them as much privacy as he could. They would only have a minute before the world interrupted, but this was her chance to put back some of those walls. If they could just leave this whole conversation here in the room, pretend it had never happened…

Her lightning fast thoughts were stalled by one stray question from her sub-conscious. _Can you do that?_ She wanted to say yes, but then she remembered the look in his eyes when he'd told the whole room how much he cared for her and her certainty wavered.

"Carter?" he said again, her name a question now.

She played with the cuffs of her sleeves for a moment before looking up at him. In his eyes, she could see that he was aware of the fork in the road in front of them as well, and he was leaving the decision up to her. She didn't know which path to take though. If she chose the first one, they would simply continue on as they had before, ignoring the growing feelings between them in order to maintain the harmony of their working relationship. That familiar road stretched out in front of her without a single bend or curve. The other path was hazier. What would happen if they talked about it? Could they talk and then return to what they had been before? There was no way… their ranks kept them apart, what would be the point…

Her mind was still whirling with the possibilities, but their precious moment of time was almost over. "I don't know sir," she finally said. She wanted nothing more than for this conversation to be over, but she just couldn't give him an answer—not yet.

He looked her up and down and then said, "All right. We'll think about it later then."

"Yes sir," she said, feeling relieved that she'd managed to push the decision back to another day. Yet somehow, even as they changed the topic back to the identity of the za'tarc, she had the feeling that by not deciding today, she'd taken that fork in the road.


	2. Chapter 2

**Title**: _Fork in the Road_

**Author**: Chocolatequeen

**Rating**: K 

**Summary**: AU Sam/Jack. "For every possible universe, there are an infinite number of variations, diverging at every choice we make like forks in a road." _AlterSam, Point of View._ After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?

**AN**: Some chapters may have bits of dialogue you recognize. Anything you recognize is taken from the show, hopefully with enough insight into the characters' thoughts that it becomes new. The farther we get from the fork in the road, the less adapted dialogue there will be, because the universe will be so different that the same conversation wouldn't happen.

**Chapter 2: If At First You Don't Succeed…**

"Oh, for crying out loud," Jack muttered when the elevator once again stopped short of his destination. It seemed the usual trip from the surface down into the mountain was taking twice the normal time, with people getting on and off at every level. He'd hoped the SFs getting off at level 16 would be his last stop before reaching the mess. He prepared to ignore whoever was getting on this time, but was surprised when it was Daniel.

"Jack, hi."

"Daniel. Been here all night?" he asked, pointing to the already empty coffee cup in his hand.

"No… I went home for a while but came back around 5:00. I wanted to make sure I have my notes ready when I meet Malaki."

"Malaki?"

"The alien archeologist on P4X-639."

"Ah yes. Looking forward to this mission, are you?"

Daniel turned toward him and Jack caught a glimpse of the enthusiasm on his face. "Jack, I don't think you understand the significance…"

Luckily for Jack, the elevator doors opened before Daniel was able to explain it to him. He started to step out, but realized that once again, he was short of his goal. "Good morning, Carter," he said when she joined them in the car. "Care to join us for breakfast?"

"That's where I was going, sir. I just wanted to get my notes for the briefing first," she said, holding up the stack of folder she had in her left hand.

He was sure there'd been a report on this at some point, but he found reading reports to be a useless waste of time. Even if he read them, he'd still have to sit in the briefings and let Carter or Daniel explain it all to him anyway. "That would be the briefing on…" he prodded.

"The coronal mass emissions on P4X-639's sun. They're causing a geomagnetic storm…"

"Ahh!" Jack held up his hand and she stopped instantly. "Save the technobabble until I've had my coffee, Carter."

"Yes sir," she said.

He was certain she was hiding a smirk, but before he could call her on it, the elevator doors opened again, this time on the right level. Daniel exited first and he moved to follow, but Carter's hand on his arm stopped him. "Sir… I was wondering if we could talk."

What did they need to talk about? He started to ask her, but then he caught the almost nervous expression in her eyes. _Oh, that talk._ To be honest, he'd almost forgotten that they'd left their personal feelings unresolved. The residual memories of Jolinar that Carter carried had made shooting Martouf very difficult for her. She'd never mentioned their unfinished talk, and he'd conveniently let it slip his mind. "Now?" he asked, glancing around the corridor. There weren't many people around, but there was always the chance someone would overhear.

"No, not now. We've got the mission and then I'll have to write my report…" She looked around the corridor herself and then back up at him. "Tomorrow night?"

"Sure," he said, sounding more confident than he felt.

They ended the conversation there, but as they walked into the mess together, Jack couldn't stop thinking about it. He selected his breakfast without giving it any thought, his mind still going back to the talk he was going to have with Carter that night.

He hadn't forgotten, not really. He'd just… tried not to think about it. They'd never settled what they were going to do about their… feelings for each other. At least he thought that was what she wanted to talk about… he was pretty sure.

"Anyway I'm sorry, but that just happens to be how I feel about it. What do you think?"

The question pulled Jack out of his reverie. Daniel was clearly waiting for some kind of answer, but he didn't think he could tell him what he was really thinking about—what was Carter going to say when they talked tonight? "I think we're going to be late for our briefing if we don't go now," he stated and moved toward the door.

Ten hours later, he was wondering why he'd even bothered to get up that morning. The mission had started out pleasantly enough—a little sun-watching with Carter, a little planetary exploration. Daniel's lack of responsiveness was the first sign that things weren't going according to plan. The second was the crackling hum that seemed to be coming from the Stargate.

_It is definitely time to get out of here,_ he thought, going in search of Daniel. When he found him unconscious in the ruins, the feeling in his gut intensified. "What the hell are you doing?" he asked Malaki, holding the archeologist by his shirt.

"Stay back!" the man warned, but he and Teal'c approached him anyway. A moment later he felt a burst of energy in the back and heard Carter call out to him. A bright white light nearly blinded him, and when he could see again, Daniel was right in front of him.

"Anyway I'm sorry, but that just seems to be how I feel about it. What do you think?"

Jack blinked a few times against the complete change in setting and lighting. He looked down at his fruit loops and then over again at Daniel, who was not unconscious but was instead gesturing with his waffles, clearly waiting for an answer to the question he'd just asked. "What?" he asked, still trying to get his bearings.

"What do you think?" Daniel pressed.

There was something familiar about all of this… the mess, the breakfast, even the look on Daniel's face. He glanced around the room, looking for some sign, some subtle change that would tell him his gut was wrong.

"Colonel, is something wrong?"

"Maybe!"

It wasn't until he was sitting in the briefing room that he knew for sure though. If there was one thing he never forgot, it was one of Carter's technobabble rambles. She just looked so… hot. He'd never forget that.

It took the combined efforts of him and Teal'c and a whole battery of tests from Doc Frasier to convince General Hammond that they weren't going crazy. Even then, he was forced to endure the ultimate punishment—staying on-world. There was nothing for him to do in his office, and as exciting as Daniel's offer of 400 pages of alien text was, he found himself in the commissary, staring moodily at a cup of coffee. He hated being inactive. There was something strange going on, and no one would let him to do anything to fix it.

"So?"

Sam's voice brought Jack back to reality. "So?" he parroted, watching her sit down through half closed eyes.

"Don't you know what I'm gonna say?" she teased.

Jack glanced down at his watch. "Actually, by this time we were on the planet. It's all different now." As soon as the words left his mouth, he wanted to take them back. Rule #1 of Carter Conversations was, "Never cut her off when she's teasing you." She tended to get nervous or jittery, and Nervous Carter quickly morphed into Professional Carter, and Professional Carter was always so careful about what she said.

Sure enough, the open expression on her face disappeared, and when she spoke again, her tone was that of the scientist—not the hot technobabble voice she used for briefings, but the serious, I just had a thought I'd like to share voice. This was not nearly as much fun as teasing, flirty Carter. "Oh, well I was thinking about what you said, about a beam hitting the Stargate."

"What about it?" he asked, trying to match her professionalism but only managing to sound bored.

"After the flash you found yourself back here. And then you were basically reliving the moments up to the mission. Maybe you're not remembering future events. Maybe you were sent back in time."

He raised an eyebrow. "For what, 6 hours?"

"Well it wouldn't be the first time we've seen something like this. I mean the Stargate did send us back to 1969," she reminded him.

Oh, he remembered. Over a week of seeing Carter in civvies, taking a road trip across the country with his three best friends… "Good year."

She gave him a half smile and then continued as if he hadn't spoken. "So I was wondering. Could this beam you mentioned be a means to access the gates subspace field in order to create some kind of time inversion outside of subspace?"

Suddenly, Jack found the continued presence of Professional Carter almost depressing, and he tried to pull the fun Carter back out from behind her mask. "I knew you were going to say that."

She laughed, and for a moment he thought he'd succeeded. Then she spoke, and he knew he hadn't. "I guess I was just thinking out loud…I'm gonna go run a few simulations."

He didn't even question the disappointment he felt when she got up and left. "You run…" he muttered. "Simulate…let me know how it turns out…keep me posted. Keep my apprised…" After all, that's what Carter did. Why should he expect things to be any different today?

He was ready for her the next loop. As soon as Frasier released him, he went down to the mess to wait for the lab results… and Carter. If he was going to be stuck reliving the same day (and it seemed he was), he would at least take the opportunity to get things right.

"So?"

He was so lost in thought that he missed her coming in, again. "So?" he parroted, watching her sit down through half closed eyes.

She took a sip of the coffee he'd poured for her before speaking. "Don't you know what I'm gonna say?" she teased.

He kept his tone as light as hers. "Funny thing about time loops, Carter. Things do change."

"So this is all new?"

"Oh yeah, it came with free steak knives and everything."

She raised an eyebrow at that. "If it's that new sir, how did you know to have a cup of coffee waiting for me?"

"That could have been for Teal'c," he pointed out, but she dodged that easily.

"Teal'c doesn't drink coffee."

He didn't have an answer for that, so instead he went back to the original conversation "So…"

She sat up a little straighter, but thankfully did not switch to Professional Carter. "I was thinking sir…"

He didn't even bother to hide his smirk. "No surprise there Carter, but continue."

"Well, if you're right and the storm caused the 'gate to access…"

She paused and Jack knew he was being tested. "The subspace field generated by the Stargate—I'm not making this stuff up."

She smiled slightly and nodded. "I didn't really think you were, sir. It's just strange to hear you say things like that."

"Everything I know about the Stargate, I learned from you," he quipped, saluting her with his coffee cup. "Now, you were saying…"

"Right. So if the theory is that a time distortion is being translated to us through the 'gate, then the only way to get to the fix the timeline is to go back to the planet and find out what's causing it… what?"

Jack knew he was grinning; he couldn't help it. "You're starting to think like me," he told her, still grinning smugly.

Talking with Carter over their morning coffee got Jack through the first few loops. Even though it was the same day repeating, over and over, there was still something new every day. It was… nice, having one thing that stayed the same every time 'round.

Unlike the day however, all good things must come to an end. They were enjoying their coffee one day when she put her cup down and stared at him. "Colonel, how long did you say we've been stuck in the time distortion?"

"Uh, about a week maybe, why?"

"You've got to stop it, sir."

"What do you think I'm doing, Carter?"

"Sir… how many times have we had this conversation?"

Jack shifted slightly. "Just this once."

"Sir."

"We may have had coffee a few other times… I need a break, Carter!"

"Daniel told me he could really use some help translating the writing from the altar. What if it turns out to be the key to stopping this whole thing?"

"So?"

"So you've got to help him, sir."

He looked plaintively down at his cup, then back at her. "No more coffee?"

She smiled slightly. "Take a few loops off, sir. I think you've had enough caffeine."

Giving up coffee with Carter put him in a sour mood, and being forced to help Daniel didn't help. He didn't argue though, because Carter was right, as usual. As soon as their obligatory exam was done the next loop, he and Teal'c went straight to Daniel's lab.

They met him at the door. "You're better off in here," Jack told him, pushing him back into the lab.

"I was just coming to look for you."

"I know."

"Anyway I'm sorry, but that just happens to be how I feel about it. What do you think?"

In reply, Jack merely dropped his head on the table. He could feel Daniel and Carter looking at him with concern, and he knew he'd have to explain the whole thing to them—again—but for now, he couldn't muster the energy to do anything more than sit there.

Repeating the same day over and over had a few benefits. He and Teal'c had their explanation down to a science. They could now persuade General Hammond that they weren't crazy in thirty minutes flat, leaving the rest of the day to find a way out of this never-ending day. At the end of the day though they were still sent back to this moment, which meant tomorrow never came. When Carter first approached him, he'd been anticipating their talk with all the enthusiasm of a man getting ready to have his teeth pulled. It was amazing how time changed things.

For the first time in his life, he was anxious to talk. He'd lost track of how much time had passed since the loops began, and he still didn't have a clue what she wanted. That hadn't mattered when he'd been pretending the whole thing hadn't happened, but now that he was facing reality... "I just want it done with so we can go back to the way things were before," he muttered.

_Are you sure that's what'll happen?_ a quiet voice asked him. He tried ignoring the question, but the voice persisted. _Well, are you?_

"I don't really see any alternatives," he retorted, glad he was alone in the elevator so no one would see him talking to himself. This argument with himself had been going on for over a week, and he knew what was coming next.

_I'm just saying that if that's all she wanted to do, she could have said so before you even left the room. Think about it Jack, why would she make you wait if she was just going to suggest pretending it never happened?_

Jack rolled his eyes. His internal dialogue was starting to sound entirely too much like Daniel.

That was the last sign of many that he'd been spending too much time with the archeologist and not enough time… elsewhere. So that afternoon, when Daniel was busy explaining the variances between Latin and Ancient conjugations to Teal'c, he slipped out of the room and wandered down a level to Sam's lab.

He watched her silently from the door for a few minutes. She was completely engrossed in some doohickey, and she was utterly oblivious to his presence. He liked watching Carter like this. "Hey," he said in greeting.

"Colonel!" She was looking at him now, and he was mildly pleased that he rated above the toys today. "What are you doing here?"

He shrugged and stuffed his hands in his pockets. Hands in pockets was one of the rules in Carter's lab, created after he'd broken an important doodad. He'd protested that it was one of a pair and there was still one left for her to study, but she'd firmly insisted that if he was going to come into her lab while she was studying things they brought back through the 'gate, he needed to keep his hands to himself.

"Just thought I'd come by, see how you were doing," he told her, rocking back on his heels.

Her brow furrowed a little. "I thought you were helping Daniel."

"I just needed a little break."

"So you came to visit me?"

"Yeah… is that okay?" Suddenly Jack felt a little uneasy. Was this breaking the rules now? He frequently visited Carter in her lab when he was feeling bored or restless, but maybe things were different now.

Her smile reassured him. It was the first true megawatt Carter smile he'd gotten since the loops started, and he couldn't help but grin back. "It's just fine, sir. I'm just a little confused… you left Daniel to see me. Don't you want a break from scientists?"

"It's been a long time since I've seen you as just a scientist, Carter." He didn't even realize what he'd said until her eyes widened. "I mean, you're a soldier too. You shoot things." He smiled nervously and pretended to shoot the lamp with his hands.

"So does Daniel," she said quietly, staring at him so intently that he thought he knew what it was like to be one of her doohickeys.

"Right. Bad example," he muttered. "You're just… Carter," he said lamely. There wasn't any other way to explain it. She was equal parts geeky scientist, kick-ass soldier, and beautiful woman. But the longer he stood there, the longer she looked at him like she was trying to figure something out. "Maybe I should just go…" he muttered and turned to leave.

"No! I mean, you don't have to go, sir." He looked at her over his shoulder and saw something in her eyes he'd never expected to see. She _wanted_ him there. There was a pile of paperwork sitting on her desk and one of her precious doohickeys on the table, but she wanted to be with him. He was glad he rated above the paperwork, but finding out he was more important than her fancy toys was a very pleasant surprise.

"I can do that," he agreed easily and took a seat across the table from her. "So, what does thing do anyway?" he asked.

Carter slapped away the hand that was reaching out to poke it. "The rules, sir," she said primly.

After that, Jack made sure Carter breaks were a part of every loop. He could go several loops without sleep, and even a couple without eating much more than the fruit loops, but more than one without seeing Carter and he started to go a little batty. Even better, he knew that she enjoyed talking to him just as much.

"Exactly how many of these time loops have you—have we been through?" Daniel asked one afternoon. They were sitting in his lab, watching Teal'c work on the translation, much like any number of other afternoons he'd endured in the last God knows how many weeks.

_Enough that I've learned Latin and some Ancient, and that I'm starting to think Carter and I will never actually be able to have that talk,_ he thought to himself. Out loud he said, "Enough."

"That must be frustrating."

"You have _no_ idea, Danny-boy."

"No, I mean… you haven't gotten to talk to Sam yet, have you?"

"What do you know about that?" he practically growled."

"I ah… might have overheard Sam asking if you could talk earlier. I have a feeling I know what she wanted to talk about…"

"Daniel, did it ever occur to you that you might keep your nose out of other people's business?"

"Jack, come on. Think about it! You've got all the time in the world, you could have a few practice runs before it really mattered."

He nearly growled his response. "I am not going to have this conversation with her when she won't even remember it!"

Daniel practically danced in his seat. "Ah! Then I was right! That is what you're going to talk about."

That shut Jack up. The whole conversation had been nothing more than a fishing expedition on Danny's part, and he'd fallen for it. He should have known better—Daniel's strict conscience wouldn't allow him to suggest he talk to Carter about their relationship anymore than his own (admittedly more battered) conscience would allow him to actually do it.

"Daniel, don't you know that nosiness is one of the seven deadly sins?"

"No it isn't, Jack. Those are gluttony, sloth—"

Jack waved his hand impatiently, cutting the litany off. "If it isn't, it should be."

"Exactly how many of these time loops have you—have we been through?" Daniel asked Jack while they both watched Teal'c at the chalkboard.

"Enough."

"That must be frustrating."

Jack rolled his eyes. _Haven't we had this conversation before? We are so not going there again… _"Err…yeah!"

"On the other hand it's kind of an opportunity."

He wasn't seeing it. An opportunity to go crazy maybe… But this conversation sounded different than the one from a few weeks ago, and anything new was welcome. "How's that?" he asked cautiously, just in case they did go back down the same path.

Daniel sat up and began to explain. "Well think about it, I mean if you know in advance that everything is always going to go back to the way it was then…you could do anything for as long as you want without having to worry about the consequences."

_Without having to worry about the consequences…_ Instantly, his mind went to Carter and all the things… _But that wouldn't be fair, she wouldn't remember._ Still, there were some things he was dying to try, but he'd never done them, either because the possible consequences were too severe, or because he simply lacked the time—something he had in ample abundance now.

Looking over at Teal'c, he knew his friend had followed his train of thought. They had all the time in the world to finish the translation. It was time they both had a little fun. "Excuse me."

He tried to convince himself that he shouldn't kiss Sam. While he was learning pottery, he listed all the different reasons it would be wrong. He'd be taking advantage, she wouldn't remember, what if somehow, this was the last loop and there were consequences? Even he knew that last one didn't hold water. If they loops hadn't magically stopped by now, they weren't going to. Still, the other two were valid concerns.

He still hadn't made up his mind when his pottery was perfected, so he went golfing with Teal'c to distract himself. From the moment he'd understood the concept of the Stargate, he'd wanted to drive a golf ball through the wormhole, just to see it disappear. Those pesky consequences had kept him from doing it, but they couldn't stop him now. In fact, it was almost fun seeing the wrath on the general's face, knowing it would all be erased in a few short minutes.

In the end, no amount of distraction could keep him from doing the one thing he'd wanted to do for ages. At the end of a loop nearly two weeks after Daniel had first suggested the possibility of acting without consequences, he walked into the control room. He timed it just right for the end of the loop, so there would be no time for shock or argument from anyone. "Excuse me, George," he said and handed him the paper he'd so carefully typed out.

General Hammond didn't even look at it. "Colonel what are you doing out of uniform?"

Jack looked at his watch. He didn't have time to explain. "Handing you my resignation," he said succinctly.

Behind him, he was sure his former CO was gaping like a fish, but he was far more interested in the reaction of the woman in front of him. She stood up and took a step toward him. "Resigning, what for?" she asked.

Was that hope in her eyes? He wasn't sure… "So I can do… this." Without another word of explanation, he pulled her close and dipped her into a kiss. If this was the only chance he'd ever have to kiss Carter, he wanted to do it right… and judging from her response, he was. He felt her fingers slide through the hair at the nape of his neck, and something inside of him soared, free of everything that had held it back before. Then the light flashed again and he was back in the mess.

He finally understood—this was the missing piece. He'd known for weeks, months even, than Malaki was the key to unraveling the whole time loop. What he hadn't known was why the man would do it. Jack had lost enough in his own life though that he could understand why someone would want to turn back the clock. He heard Carter ask if he was going to cure her, and expected Malaki's agreement. That would be the only logical reason…

"No that would be quite impossible. She died from a congenital heart weakness. Not even the ability to travel time could change that."

"Then why are you doing this?" He had to ask. If there was no chance to cure her, why go back in time? He took his sunglasses off to be able to see the man more clearly, and to watch his facial expressions for any sign that he was lying to them.

Once again, the man's simple answer stunned him. "To be with her once more."

There was so much wrong with that logic, but hadn't he used the loops the same way? He'd used the time, over and over again, just to get to know Sam. He knew it wouldn't work the way Malaki wanted them to, and he let Daniel explain that to him, waiting impatiently for the man to get the hint.

"The people who made that machine are the same ones who made the Stargates and they couldn't get the damn thing to work," he broke in finally, anxious to get this day over with once and for all. "And even if you could just for the sake of arguing, you can't change what happened to her."

"I can touch her face again and talk with her, hear her laugh."

The happy laughter of a child echoed through his memory. "Like you remember?"

"Yes."

"And then what'll happen?"

"She'll die."

He still wasn't getting it. "And then what? You'll start over?" Before Malaki could answer, the pieces on the altar started moving again, and Jack knew that he was—ironically—running out of time "Listen to me, I know what it's like."

"You can't!"

"I lost my son, I know! And as much as I—I could never live that over again." He paused, brought himself back under control. He could sense Carter watching and felt a moment of satisfaction that she would see and remember him sharing emotions. "Could you?"

"No."

"Let her go," Jack urged.

He held his breath for a moment until the other man reached out and pressed a few stones on the altar. The charge in the air dissipated and then the force shield in front of them vanished.

Once it was clear, he walked around the altar and took the picture of Malaki's wife out of the bag and handed it to him. The look on the man's face reminded him that as much as he knew of loss, he also had the possibility of a new future.

"I don't think I've ever seen anyone enjoy oatmeal so much."

Jack took another bite before answering. "When you've been eating fruit loops for who knows how long, a little variety helps."

"Let me ask you something," Daniel said. "In all the time that you were… err… looping, were you ever tempted to do something crazy?"

He took in the way Daniel's eyes darted from Carter and back to him with narrowed eyes. Daniel still knew about their impending conversation. "I mean, you could do anything without worrying about the consequences."

He was suddenly aware that Daniel was not the only one interested in his answer. Carter was looking at him very intently as well. A smug smirk started at the corners of his mouth and he said, "You know it's funny. You asked me that before."

Daniel looked back and forth between him and Carter once more "And?"

Instead of answering, Jack took another huge bite of oatmeal and just stared at Carter, a full smirk on her face now. _1, 2, 3…_ he counted, waiting patiently for what he knew was coming. "What are you smiling at?" she asked.

"Nothin'."


	3. Chapter 3

**Title**: _Fork in the Road_

**Author**: Chocolatequeen

**Rating**: K 

**Summary**: AU Sam/Jack. "For every possible universe, there are an infinite number of variations, diverging at every choice we make like forks in a road." _AlterSam, Point of View._ After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?

**Chapter 3: Dead End**

Sam nervously ran her hands over her short locks for the fifth time in as many minutes, but she resisted checking her appearance in a mirror. "This is not a date,"she reminded herself.

_You'd like it to be a date though, wouldn't you?_ She didn't even bother denying it. If there was a way this evening could be a date, rather than an… appointment…

_An appointment to talk about your relationship,_ the voice taunted. _Sounds like a date to me._

She resolutely ignored the jab. She'd been putting this conversation off for… well, what felt like two weeks, as she told herself that she just needed a little more time to deal with Martouf's death. Turns out, she'd had plenty of time, according to everything Teal'c and the Colonel had said about the time loops. 

The doorbell rang, drawing her back to the present. "Thank you for coming, sir," she said as she opened the door. "If you'll sit down in the living room, I'll bring us both a cup of coffee."

"Sure thing," he said, shrugging his leather jacket off and tossing it over a chair.

Sam watched him sit down and then escaped into the kitchen. Once there, she leaned against the cupboard and took a deep breath. _Why does he have to be so… gorgeous?_ she wailed silently. Somehow, she always forgot how attractive he looked in street clothes—a defense mechanism, she supposed.

Another deep breath and her pulse slowed enough that she could pour two cups of coffee without her hands shaking in the slightest. With a smile pasted on her face, she carried them into the living room, where the Colonel lounged in one of her arm chairs as if he belonged there. Pretending the sight didn't send a shaft of longing through her, she handed one cup to him and then took the chair opposite. "So, I guess we should talk about why I asked you here," she started nervously.

He grinned at her over the lip of his mug. "I think we both know why I'm here, Carter. Question is, what are we going to do about this?" he asked, gesturing between them so she wouldn't misunderstand what he was asking.

She blinked in confusion. What were they going to do? They didn't exactly have a whole lot of options. "I think it's pretty obvious what we need to do, sir. Our jobs, our military ranks…"

The grin disappeared, and Sam could tell this was not what he had expected. "And that's more important than what we feel?" he countered. 

"I don't really see any alternatives," she said resolutely.

His shifted slightly in his chair, but his eyes never left hers. They were calm, assured, knowing. "Come on Carter, I know you don't want to do this."

She wanted to be angry with him, but there was something familiar about his tone… it was the same one he'd used that morning when she'd asked him why he was staring at her. 

_Did something happen between us during the loops?_

She knew that if she'd been given a chance to act without consequences, things would be different between them. Still, he had to know that whatever had gone on between them had been a fluke, a direct result of circumstances that could never be reproduced, no matter how much they both might wish they could be. 

She kept her voice even when she answered. "That's pretty presumptuous, Colonel."

"I'm not being presumptuous, I'm just…" He cut himself off abruptly, as if he'd remembered that he couldn't tell her what he'd been about to. When he didn't finish, she was more certain than ever that there were things he wasn't telling her about the time loops. _I can't think about what might have happened,_ she told herself. _We have to finish this._

"Sir, we need to just leave it in the room."

In response, he set his cup down on the coffee table and leaned toward her. "It's been out of the room for months now, Carter. Do you really think it'll be that easy to close the door on it again?"

She turned away from the emotion she saw in his eyes. "I never said it would be easy," she told him quietly, clutching her own mug like a lifeline.

There was silence for a moment, and she knew she'd just killed any chance of there being more between them. "I see," he said finally. "I guess I should go now. Don't bother seeing me to the door."

He shut the door with a little more ­­­­­­­­force than was absolutely necessary, and Sam flinched at the sound. _Why couldn't I have just done this earlier?_ she berated herself. She knew the answer though—she hadn't wanted to go on as just Major and Colonel. She still didn't want to, but it was needed, and not just because of their disparate ranks and the jobs they held.

Love hurt. She knew that better than anyone, except maybe Colonel O'Neill. She'd seen the way her father had fallen apart for a while after her mother died, and she couldn't open herself to that kind of pain. That's why she had relationships with men she thought she could fix, rather than men she thought she could love. The Colonel was far too close to the latter to be safe.

She'd thought he would understand, maybe. The emotion he'd expressed when he'd told Malaki about Charlie had been fresh, real. He knew about the pain of losing someone you loved. Why couldn't he see that she was just trying to save him—save them both—from that pain?

Realistically, she knew they'd both hurt a little bit while they worked at rebuilding the walls between them. They'd gotten too close in the last few months—far too close. Shutting each other out again was bound to hurt. In time though… _He'll eventually forget about me,_ she assured herself.

**AN:** Before you throw things at me for not getting them together immediately, allow me to explain. Sam had some serious relationship hang-ups that became obvious in Grace. She dealt with them over the next year or so through her relationship with Pete. Since I don't want to have a Pete, I had to do something else so she could work through her issues.

**Disclaimer:** Nothing related to Stargate: SG-1 belongs to me. It is all the property of multiple production companies and people who are quite a bit richer than I am. 


	4. Chapter 4

Title: Fork in the Road

**Title**: _Fork in the Road_

**Author**: Chocolatequeen

**Rating**: K 

**Summary**: AU Sam/Jack. "For every possible universe, there are an infinite number of variations, diverging at every choice we make like forks in a road." _AlterSam, Point of View._ After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?

**AN: **The quote at the beginning of this chapter is from "Try to Remember" from the musical _The Fantasticks._

**Chapter 4: Try to Remember**

_Deep in December, our hearts should remember, and follow._

She was all Jonah remembered. At least, she was the only thing he remembered that mattered. He remembered mines, and ore, and hard work… and Thera. She was by his side during the day, and at night she came to him in dreams. He knew they were close, but he hadn't asked for anything more than friendship… yet. He wanted to, but something held him back.

In his dreams though, he had no such reservations. In his dreams, he took her face in his hands and kissed her with an aching tenderness. Then when that wasn't enough, he placed one arm securely around her waist and dipped her. The exhilaration he felt when her arms snaked around his neck and she returned his kiss stayed with him even after he woke up. He didn't mind that it was only a dream. If the only way he could kiss Thera was in dreams, he'd take it.

Carlin said he'd been having dreams too, dreams of a shiny pool of water. He said they were all there… For some reason, Jonah wanted to quip, "And you were there, and you were there…" but he didn't know why.

"Do you have the same dream?" Carlin asked, looking at Jonah.

"About you?" he asked sarcastically, trying to avoid the real question.

But Thera wouldn't let him get away with it. "No, about the shimmering circle of water!"

Jonah grimaced slightly. "No, my dreams are about…" he paused and looked over at Thera, then quickly returned his attention to Carlin before either of them could notice. "…other things!" _No way am I telling these two what I dream about! _

Thanks to the talk of dreams, he only half listened when Carlin spoke again. "Tor said we had to escape. He also said we had to remember. Remember what?"

"Well I remember when I was foreman anyone caught doing what we're doing now had their rations cut in half for a month."

"We'll have to risk it!" Jonah bit back a grin—Thera's fire was the first thing that had attracted him to her. A couple of guys in the mines had been giving her a hard time, but when he'd offered to intervene for her, she'd told him bluntly that she could handle it. He hadn't expressed enough confidence to suit her, and she'd challenged him to arm wrestle—arm wrestle!—to prove her capabilities. Something about her cheekiness had drawn him at that moment, and it still did.

Carlin looked so concerned that for a moment, Jonah thought he was going to argue. "What if our memories have been somehow altered?"

_Ah, that again._

"Well if that's true then we can't be sure of anything," Thera pointed out.

He balked against her logic. "My memory's fine!" _Very, very fine in fact…_

"Really?" Carlin asked, one brow raised in doubt or speculation.

"Yeah!"

"What did you do in the mines?" he asked smoothly.

He didn't try to hide his eye roll. "I mined."

Carlin didn't let it go. "No…what did you do?"

He frowned. There had been work, and there had been Thera. What else was there to remember? "I remember shoveling ore into a cart," he said finally.

But Carlin wasn't satisfied. "And?"

"I did that a lot," he retorted, ignoring the smirk on Carlin's face.

Thera spoke then, breaking the standoff between the two men. "I remember a feeling of cold and darkness." Jonah felt a pang of guilt. He could remember the feel of her curled up next to his side, unable to get warm. He hadn't been able to keep her warm, but had he kept her happy?

"And that's where the two of you met?" Carlin pressed. 

"Yeah!"

Thera looked at him, surprised. "Really?"

"Sure," he said easily, but without telling them what he remembered. He wouldn't let that memory be picked apart by Carlin. "So what's this important thing we're supposed to be doing?" he said, trying to change the subject.

"I told you I don't know," Carlin said, some exasperation showing now. "I keep trying to remember but all I can come up with is images of this place."

"But if you're right then everything we remember about this place is a lie!" 

"It's like a façade. It only works if we don't dig too deep beneath the surface, if we don't question it. So that's what we have to do. We have to question every assumption, everything."

"We have to keep this to ourselves," Thera cautioned them. "If the others heard us talking this way they'd think we were night sick."

"What if we are night sick?" 

"I don't think so sir!"

He raised an eyebrow at the honorific. "What?" he and Carlin said in unison.

She looked first at him, then at Carlin. "What?"

Carlin answered first. "You just called Jonah sir."

She looked at him again and he raised an eyebrow in question. "Well it's an expression, isn't it?" They quickly agreed with her, but he had an uneasy feeling that the address meant far more to them than any expression.

He had another dream that night. Thera was standing just inches away, but he couldn't touch her. Something blue shimmered between them, keeping them apart. He was angry; angry at whatever it was that was keeping him from her. She was in danger. He could sense it deep in his bones, though he couldn't have said why. She was in danger and he couldn't get to her. He tried beating against the blue shield between them, but it would not break. He beat against the wall, he yelled, and then she was yelling back. "Sir, there's no time!"

Sir. She called him sir. 

He whirled on her, ready to yell again, but then he saw the look in her eyes and he couldn't. He couldn't yell, because he saw something there he'd never expected, never dreamed to see. All the emotions he felt were staring back at him from her blue eyes. There was fear and desperation, but mostly there was acceptance… and love. 

Love. She loved him. The emotion hit him so hard that for a moment, he couldn't do anything but stare at her, every invisible wall between them wiped away, though the visible one remained. In that moment, they shared a lifetime of joy and sorrow, each knowing it might be their last moment alive and neither caring, as long as they died together.

The powerful feelings within him would not remain contained—he had to speak them aloud. But when he opened his mouth, no sound would come out. Instead, he simply mouthed the truth to her: I love you.

And then the blue disappeared and he was able to touch her again, but instead they began running without a word, away from the nameless danger.

He awoke with a start, the adrenaline still rushing through him. This dream was not just a dream, he knew that. The depth of emotion it had tapped was far too real and painful to be conjured, it had to be real. The thought that he had once been unable to save Thera… that made the dream a nightmare. 

Try as he might to forget it, the dream was on his mind all day. Every time he saw Thera, he thought he saw a bluish shimmer obscuring her features. He found himself reaching out to touch her, just to make sure he could. 

By the time Carlin joined them for the evening meal, he couldn't think of anything else. He had to know if this painful memory return was happening to the others, or if it was just him. "Any more dreams?"

He waited impatiently while Carlin hungrily ate a few bites of food before answering. "I saw the pool of light again. Except this time we were all there, including Tor."

There was a quick, expectant glance, and suddenly he realized the position he'd placed himself in. He'd asked for information, he couldn't refuse to answer, but this dream had been even more personal than the last. "I dreamed about mining…naked," he stated, making up the wildest story he could come up with, hoping the message would be clear: Don't ask.

He ignored the surprise he could feel coming from Thera. Carlin simply accepted it and moved on. "Thera?"

She frowned in the way she always did when she was thinking, and a shot of longing went through Jonah. Did she even know what she did to him? Had they told each other in the past, and he'd forgotten? Or was he seeing something that wasn't there? Maybe that moment he'd dreamed about had been a long time ago, and they'd moved on… Maybe it didn't mean anything.

"Well it must mean something," Thera said, and Jonah jolted back to the present. For a moment, he had the wild thought that she'd read his mind, but then he realized that she was talking to Carlin and he'd missed part of the conversation.

He started to talk, to make a smartass remark that would lighten the tension growing between them, but then something caught his eye. A large dome bowl… "Excuse me?" he said to the man who had just finished eating from it. He needed that bowl, though he didn't know why. He offered his food for it, and the man agreed to the exchange, clearly thinking he was crazy to give up food for an empty bowl.

He turned the bowl over in his hands several times, trying to see what it was that had sparked his memory. "Jonah?" Thera prodded.

He put it down, bottom up. "That means something."

"What is it?"

"I don't know yet."

No sooner had the words left his mouth than he was once again lost in a moment from the past, but this time he was still awake. He saw himself looking out a window, and then turning to talk to a well-dressed man, seated behind a desk. "Very impressive," he heard himself say, but before he could figure out what was impressive, he was back in the eating area with his friends, staring at the bowl.

Later, long after Carlin had gone to sleep, long after they should have been in bed, Jonah and Thera were still up, trying to piece together their missing memories. "I remember something," he said. "There was a man. He's bald and wears a short sleeve shirt and somehow he's very important to me." He glanced over at Thera and saw the furrow between her brows. "I think his name is Homer."

"It doesn't ring a bell."

"Damn…you?" 

"Just a lot of vague images," she said and Jonah fought disappointment. He'd hoped his dream of the kiss was a repressed memory as well, like her dream of the shimmering puddle. 

_Must not be, or she'd remember it too._

What she did next made him feel better though. She leaned into him and rested her head on his shoulder. "There are things about this place that I like…" she said, and he easily followed her train of thought.

"Me too," he agreed and wrapped his left arm around her, pulling her close. He thought about wanted to say for a moment and then decided to bite the bullet. Even if the kiss wasn't real, she obviously felt something for him. Last night's dream came to him again, and with it the image of that love written so clearly in her expression. "Would it mean anything if I told you I remember something else?"

"What?"

"Feelings."

She shifted slightly so she could look at him. "Feelings?" she asked, her eyes moving, searching his expression for something.

For the first time in as long as he could remember, Jonah let down his guard and allowed someone to really see him. "I remember feeling feelings," he repeated, willing her to understand.

"For me?"

"No, for Tor." She turned her face into his shoulder, and he could feel her laughter. "I don't remember much, but I do remember that."

She looked at him again, and something in her blue eyes made his breath quicken. "So…" she said, her gaze traveling from his eyes down to his mouth and back up to his eyes.

"So… I'm just saying," he told her as he slowly leaned closer.

"Well then I feel better," she whispered just before their lips met. She tasted just like he remembered, and he suddenly knew that the other kiss was not just a dream. He didn't know why she couldn't remember it, but he knew that no matter how active his imagination was, he never could have come up with the perfect combination of sugar and spice that was kissing Thera.

His dreams that night were jumbled, fast moving clips that didn't make any sense. He saw Thera lying on a concrete floor behind bars, and he jumped over two bodies to reach her. In a flash, he saw her lying on a bed, near death, with a doctor standing over her, working frantically to save her. Another flash, they were in a dark, dank place, and she was being dragged away from him by some thug. _Flash!_ She was lying in front of him again, this time covered by nothing more than a metallic looking blanket. _Flash! _She was lying prone on a forest floor, unconscious. _Flash!_ She was literally writhing against memories too painful to handle.

Before another scene could flash in front of him, Jonah forced himself awake. The impulse to check on her was irresistible. He propped himself up on his elbow and glanced down at the bed in front of him. _She's there, she's fine, it was just a dream._

He lay awake for the rest of the night, staring at the ceiling. Even awake, the images burned in his mind, leaving him with the impression that he'd let her down, several times over. _She needed me, and I wasn't there for her._

The morning bell finally rang, and the people around him began to get up as well. Thera glanced over at him and smiled shyly, and he managed a small smile in return. _If she remembered all the things I've let happen to her, she wouldn't smile at me like that,_ he told himself. With the certainty that she would regain her memories, he decided to enjoy it while it lasted.

"Ready for breakfast?" he asked, keeping his tone as light as possible.

She reached for her bulky shirt, but he stopped her. "I kinda like the little tank top number," he said with a wink. She blushed, but left the orange top where it lay at the foot of her bed. 

Together they walked toward the eating area and got in line. He groaned inwardly when he saw it was Keegan's turn to serve the meal again. However, she didn't address them at all, though he did see her giving Thera a hard glare when she handed over the bowl of gruel.

"Good morning," Carlin said when they sat down next to him. "So, did you have time to think about the bowl?" he said quietly.

Jonah blinked. Between his dreams and watching Thera's movements in the thin top, he hadn't given the bowl another thought. "I'll get back to you on it," he promised.

"Jonah, that might be the key to what's going on here."

"Carlin! I said I'd get back to you."

An unexpected giggle broke the tension. He looked askance at Thera and saw Carlin do the same out of the corner of his eye. "I'm sorry," she said, putting a hand over her mouth to hide her grin. "This just seems so familiar, I couldn't help it."

Jonah looked back at Carlin, and suddenly they were all grinning. They were friends, part of a team. They knew that much, and the rest of the details would come.

The lightness they'd felt at breakfast quickly evaporated in the hard work of the day. Thera went to her station monitoring the intake and pressure on the various pumps and valves, and he and Carlin went to work manually turning them off and on as she directed. For most of the morning and into the afternoon, the only sounds were the loud chug of the turbines or the directions from Thera.

Sometime around mid-afternoon, he heard something else from pump four. He couldn't be sure over the noise of the plant, but it sounded like yelling, and one of the voices sounded like Thera's. Without another thought, he gripped the wrench he was holding and moved quickly toward the commotion.

"Why do you get to tell us what to do?" Keegan yelled.

_Not her... What is her problem?_

Thera was working the manual shut off valve, but she couldn't get it to turn, and Keegan wouldn't help her. "Brenna asked me…"

"You've been sucking up to Brenna for as long as you've been here, trying to get special treatment! Well you're not special!"

She gave up on the valve and turned to her foe. "Brenna asked me to manually monitor the pumps, since we can't put a system in place to do it for us." Jonah admired the calm way she'd said that; he knew it still irked her that her plans had been dismissed.

"And who said we needed a system? We were doing fine before you got here."

"Were you?" Thera retorted, and Jonah edged a bit closer. Something familiar in her voice told him that she was about to let Keegan have it, and there was no telling how the other woman would take that. "If you were doing just fine, then tell me why the generators had to be down for a total of three days last month alone while we brought repaired various pumps and brought them back online." Keegan just glared. "Face it, Keegan. You need me."

From his vantage point, Jonah could see it all coming together in a way no one else could. Keegan and the boiler both reached their melting point at the same time. Without thinking, he rushed forward. With one hand, he blocked the blow that was meant for Thera. With the other, he pushed her out of the way just as the valve blew, spewing hot water and steam on everything, including his hand. 

He easily hid the pain from her, knowing she wouldn't leave if she knew he was hurt. "Get out of here!" he ordered.

"Jonah!" 

He could hear the fear and the indecision in her voice, and he steeled himself against it. "Get out! Get Carlin to help me!"

She nodded and he turned to the pump, confident she would do as he had asked. The whole situation was so similar to the one that had led Carlin to them, but he didn't have time to wait for a mallet to move the lever. Instead, he whipped his jacket off and wrapped it around the handle, wincing when the heat seeped through into his injured hand. Even through the steam, he could see the skin reddening and blistering already.

Then Carlin was at his side, and together they managed to get the pump back under control. When they were done, Carlin reached to take his hand, just as he had before, but Jonah winced and pulled it back. 

"Are you hurt?" Carlin asked suspiciously.

"It'll heal," he mumbled.

"I'm taking you to the medic." 

Jonah tried to argue, but it got him nowhere. In the end, it was the pain that finally convinced him to go. The medic took one look at his hand and pulled out a nasty smelling salve that he liberally smeared all over the burn. Then he bandaged it up and proceeded to do a thorough check up on both him and Carlin.

Carlin was dismissed quickly, but Jonah was forced to stay and endure an hour of poking and prodding. Brenna came down during that time, to thank him once again and deliver a welcome piece of news.

"I've decided to transfer Keegan back to the mines," she announced. "Her mistrust does more harm than good when it is teamwork that is needed."

Once the medic had cleared him, the first thing he did was look for Thera. He'd had a lousy day, and he just needed her. However, the only friend he saw by the tables was Carlin. He didn't even have to ask. One look and the other man pointed to the corridor that led back to the pumps. "When I told her heard you were injured, she took off," he said. 

That was all he needed to hear. With a quick grateful smile at Carlin, he followed her path down into the bowels of the plant and found Thera right where he knew she'd be—hard at work over pump four. "Hey."

"Hey Jonah. I don't really have time to talk; this pump is still acting up…"

There was something in her voice that bugged him, but he couldn't pin it down. He knew he'd be able to figure it out if he could see her eyes, but she wouldn't look at him. "Thera." Her fingers clenched around the pipe she was holding, and he waited. Slowly, she lifted her eyes to his and he was surprised by what he saw there—fear. "Hey, what's this about?" he asked gently.

"I… you…" She halted, and he let her look away to gather her thoughts. "I don't know if I can do this, Jonah," she said finally.

"Do what?" he asked, trying to ignore the heaviness settling in the pit of his stomach.

"This, us!" she exclaimed, gesturing between them with the pipe. "Feeling feelings! I can't do it." 

The whole conversation was horribly familiar, and he knew they'd had it before. _"Sir, we need to just leave it in the room."_

This time though he wasn't going to let go without a fight. "Mind telling me why not?" he asked, amazed by how mild his voice sounded. "You didn't seem to have a problem with it last night."

Her face flushed a little at the reminder of the kiss they'd shared, and she looked away again. "I don't want to lose you," she said, her voice so quiet he had to strain to hear it.

He let out the breath he'd been holding in a huff. "You don't want to lose me, so you're pushing me away?" he asked, incredulous. "For someone so smart, that is incredibly stupid."

That got her attention. The pipe clattered to the floor when she put her hands on her hips and glared at him. "You don't understand!" she said through gritted teeth, and he got the distinct impression that if she hadn't been afraid of drawing a crowd, she'd be yelling at him.

"So explain it to me," he countered, unwilling to back down.

"I don't want to you to die," she bit out, still angry.

This was making less and less sense. "Everyone dies, Thera."

"I know that!" she said and threw up her hands in exasperation. "But if I… care for you, and then you die…"

And suddenly he got it. He'd gotten hurt, and that had brought these fears of losing him to the surface. He could understand that—he had very vivid memories of feeling his heart in his throat when she did something dangerous, and that wasn't even including what she did here in the plant. He considered it an acceptable risk though, made worth it by how he felt when they were together. If only he could convince her… "Well, you know what they say, Thera." He lifted his good hand in a gesture he somehow knew was called "air quotes." "Tis better to have loved and lost…"

"Loved?" she queried.

Whatever else he remembered, Jonah was certain he'd loved Thera for a long time. This wasn't how he wanted to tell her though, so he shrugged and said, "It's an expression."

She looked at him a moment longer and then nodded slowly. "I'll think about it," she promised, and he supposed he couldn't ask for more than that.

"So, now that we've talked, are you ready to go to bed?" Both her eyebrows shot up. _Idiot!_ he chastised himself. "Not together! C'mon, Thera, you know me better than that."

She blushed and looked away. "You're right, I do," she admitted, and he knew she was thinking about more than his verbal slip. "It's been a long day, let's go to bed," she agreed.

Hours later, Jonah was still lying in bed, wide awake. It would have been easy to say it was the burn that kept him up—the salve had worn off hours ago. However, if he was honest with himself… _Am I ever?_ He knew his conversation with Thera still bothered him. Judging from her breathing, it was still bothering him too.

_Well, if I can't sleep I might as well use my time wisely,_ he thought and pulled the bowl he'd traded for from behind his pillow. He stared at it for a few minutes, and suddenly he was transported to the same moment he'd seen before. He watched the whole scene unfold before his eyes—the revelation of the city above, the forced labor of the workers, the way they'd been shanghaied into joining them. He could remember it all, minus a few hazy details about their own lives.

Somehow, in the middle of the vision he must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he was aware of was the morning bell, waking him up. He rolled out of bed and secured the bowl back under his pillow before he walked over to the head of Thera's bed.

"I think I know what's going on," he told her. 

She sat up quickly, but before he could say anything else, another worker approached him. "Jonah, Thera, report to Brenna's office."

He looked over at Thera and knew without asking that they both felt the same trepidation. He shrugged slightly; they didn't really have a choice. Together they walked toward Brenna's office. 

They were halfway there when they met Carlin. "Did Brenna ask to see you too?" he asked. "I wonder what this is about," he said when Thera nodded.

Jonah didn't, it was patently obvious to him. Brenna had been told that they'd been meeting in private, and she'd called them in to punish them in some way. Maybe she even thought they were nightsick, though he was suspicious nightsickness wasn't exactly what they claimed it was either. 

The trio walked together in a triangle formation, with Jonah at the head and Thera and Carlin slightly behind and flanking him. Whatever they were going to face in Brenna's office, he wanted to be the one to face it first, so he could protect his team if at all possible. He was the one who knocked on the door, and when she told them to enter, he was the one who turned the knob.

They stepped inside, and once again, Jonah remained at the center of the group. There was a moment of silence while he waited for her to explain what was happening, and then two other workers walked in, bearing a stretcher that carried someone familiar—Tor.

Brenna spoke for the first time. "Put him down over there." Once the big man was lying peacefully on the cot she'd directed them to, she ordered them to go.

"What's the matter with him?" Thera asked.

"He's dying," Brenna said, and Jonah could have sworn he heard remorse in her voice. He didn't allow himself to relax his guard, but he did hope for the first time that this confrontation might end well.

"Kel-no-rim," Carlin said, almost as if he was talking in his sleep.

"What?" Jonah asked. The term sounded familiar, but like so many things, he couldn't place it.

"I'm not sure what it means but I think…"

Carlin paused, and Jonah stared at Tor for a moment, his mind churning quickly. "It's kind of meditation. He has to do it every day or he gets sick. Right?" It sounded right, but it also sounded too crazy to be right.

Thera asked the obvious question. "So why doesn't he do it?"

But things were clicking into place for Jonah now. "Because he can't remember," he said, feeling surer by the minute. That was how they kept the workers content. They altered their memories, leaving them with nothing but this place and a strong sense that it was an honor to serve.

Brenna confirmed it the next moment. "Colonel O'Neill is correct. As you have begun to suspect, all of you have had your memories altered." She moved her gaze back to Thera. "You are Major Samantha Carter." Then she looked at Carlin and Tor, and said, "Dr. Daniel Jackson, and your friend here is named Teal'c."

Jack easily accepted the truth of their identities. There was one thing still bothering him. "Where does Homer fit in?"

Brenna blinked. "You are all they sent down. At first I thought it was necessary to protect the city but now things have gone too far…you don't belong here. You need to return to your own world. Your memories will come back more quickly once you return home." 

He realized then that there were still a few holes in his memory. "Home?"

"Yes, through there." Jack looked at the wall she pointed at and raised his brows. Then she hit a button behind her desk and the wall slid open.

Unfortunately, it appeared her actions were not unanticipated. The man he remembered from his dreams was standing there, along with two armed guards, and he did not look pleased. Jack wasn't pleased either, but that was because of the guns that were pointed at him and his team.

"Administer Calder," Brenna said, her voice faltering.

The administrator's attention was focused on Brenna. "Brenna, I must say I'm disappointed, but not surprised. You see, I've been watching you growing weaker for some time now."

"I've been coming to my senses!" she spat out, and he had to admire her courage.

"Either way. You're no longer of any use to me!" Jack watched him point a gun at her and shoot her, angered by the impotence he felt. He would have liked to help her; she had been willing to help them. 

He ignored the guns pointed at them, knowing the real threat came from the man in front of him. "As for the rest of you, it's time you found out what the surface of the planet is really like."

He started to raise his gun, but before he could, Teal'c shot out of his bed and attacked the guard closest to him. Jack instinctively knocked out and disarmed the other guard, and when he turned on Calder, he saw that Daniel had knocked him to the floor.

The leader in Jack took over, and he moved toward Calder, keeping his gun trained on him. "Teal'c, you alright?" he asked, never once letting Calder out of his sight.

The Jaffa's deep, even tones reassured him. "I am."

"What happened?" Daniel asked.

"When I removed my bandages and realized I was unlike the rest of you I began to remember. I placed myself in a deep state of Kel-no-rim for the night. My symbiote restored me to health."

"Brenna should be alright if we can get her to the err…" Carter faltered, looking to him for the word.

"Infirmary."

"Right."

"You'll never make it back to the Stargate!" Calder threatened. 

Jack just looked at him for a moment. _Why does the bad guy always think he can win, even when I'm holding his gun?_ he wondered briefly. Aloud, he said, "You know something. We've got you as a hostage. I don't see a problem."

Daniel interrupted. "Jonah!"

"Jack!" 

"Right…we can't. We have to tell these people what's happening." 

He looked at Calder and saw fear that he would do exactly that. More than any moral argument Daniel could have given, that made up his mind. "Yep…you're right." 

He motioned for Daniel to open the door, and then they stepped out onto the balcony together. As insurance that Calder wouldn't do something to keep them from telling the truth, he placed the barrel of the gun under his right ear. 

"Everyone! Can I have your attention please?" He waited for the workers to look up at him and then continued. "I'd like to introduce you to someone. This man has been keeping you locked up down here while he and his friends live it up on the surface."

"Don't listen to them," Calder shouted, heedless of the gun resting against his head. "They shot Brenna!"

From where he was, Jack could see the sweat that was dripping off the other man. He knew he was nervous, terrified even, but the workers couldn't tell that. All they could see was one man holding a gun and another man claiming he'd already shot one person.

The murmurs began, and sensing he was gaining ground, Calder continued, his voice calmer. "It's true!"

_Oh for crying out loud…_

"Listen to me! There's a big domed city up there. Full of people you serve! They've been hiding the truth from you your entire lives!" There were murmurings of disbelief, but no one outwardly challenged them. Jack felt a stir of gratitude that Kegan was gone. Somehow, he didn't think she'd have been so quiet.

"Who's that with you?" one of the workers finally asked.

It was obvious even to Calder that they were beginning to believe. "My name is Calder," he said, sounding desperate. "I was a supervisor in the mines before I was transferred!" 

Jack rolled his eyes. "Yeah whatever! You want proof?" he shouted down at the workers. He aimed his gun at one of the sky lights and fired, ignoring the anxious shouts coming from below. "No ice! No snow!"

The workers below stilled in awe as they stood in sunlight for the first time in their memory. "You've accomplished nothing!" Calder said beside him. "These people will never be accepted in the city!"

_What makes you think they'd want to be accepted by you? _"I think you're right about that."

As happened so often, Daniel read his mind. "That's why we're going to offer them a better place."

"There's this nice little tropical planet out there where the beaches go on forever! This I remember clearly. You and your people can do your own shoveling for a while."

"You're destroying a way of life!"

"That's a shame. Teal'c, show these people how to get out of here!" Without a backward glance, he left the administrator standing alone on the walkway, watching his workforce walk away from him. 

He and Daniel stood in the doorway for a moment while Thera… _Carter,_ he reminded himself, bandaged Brenna. Once again, he found himself amazed at all the things she could do.

"It hurts!" the former supervisor said, cradling her arm to her.

"I know. Try not to move it. We're going to take you home with us." She helped her to her feet, and then Daniel gently took her uninjured arm and led her out of the office, leaving him alone with Carter.

Jack was uncomfortably certain that the move had been planned. Daniel, as Carlin, had seen the closeness develop between him and his 2IC, and he probably thought they needed to talk. What he didn't know was that they'd already had this talk.

"So, Jonah."

Jack quirked an eyebrow. Maybe this conversation wasn't going to go like the last one had. If he could just get Carter to call him by his first name as easily as Thera did… "Jack," he corrected.

She smiled but didn't repeat it. "That bald man you were trying to remember…"

"General Hammond."

"Right." She smiled again, but it wasn't quite as bright as the smiles Thera had given him this week. 

In his gut, he knew where this was going, but he wanted to put it off as long as possible. "He's from Texas you know," he said unnecessarily. "It's all coming back!"

When he saw the look on her face, he wanted to bite his tongue off. _Way to go Jack,_ he derided himself. _Remind her of all the things you forgot this week… things like frat regs and a little conversation about leaving it in the room._

"Yes sir."

He had to look down for a minute so she wouldn't see how much that hurt. Even though he knew that was what they'd decided—_what she'd decided—_and even though he understood it now, after Thera explained her fears, her rejection still stung. 

"Sir," he repeated, letting her know exactly what he thought of that title. He would have said more, but he looked back at her at that moment and realized that cutting him off was hurting her just as much. He sighed internally and said, "Let's go home."

"Yes sir," she replied obediently, but as they walked toward the Stargate, he vowed that he'd get her to call him something beside sir, even if it took him another three years.

**Disclaimer:** Nothing related to Stargate: SG-1 belongs to me. It is all the property of multiple production companies and people who are quite a bit richer than I am. 


	5. Chapter 5

Title: Fork in the Road

**Title**: _Fork in the Road_

**Author**: Chocolatequeen

**Rating**: K+

**Summary**: AU Sam/Jack. "For every possible universe, there are an infinite number of variations, diverging at every choice we make like forks in a road." _AlterSam, Point of View._ After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?

**Dedication:** This chapter is dedicated to Jasmina who suggested that oxygen-deprived Jack might have said something embarrassing, and Bekki who helped me work out exactly what he said.

**Chapter 5: Worth It**

Sam sighed while she settled into her seat on the scout ship. They'd gated to the planet, they'd found her dad—or he'd found them—and now they were on their way to rescue Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c, but she couldn't get rid of the unease she felt. She'd had the carpet yanked out from under her too many times today to believe that something had finally gone right. She rubbed her stomach slightly, trying to dispel the knots that had been building since they'd first lost contact with the X-301.

_Be honest, Sam,_ she chided herself. _You've been feeling like this for longer than just a day. You haven't felt right since…_

She wouldn't let the word form in her mind, but she knew exactly when this restlessness had begun—after the za'tarc test, when she and the Colonel had been forced to admit their feelings for each other. It wasn't the confessions that had caused the problems though. They hadn't really said anything they didn't already know. No, the problems came when they gave their feelings room to breathe before boxing them back up.

_Why didn't I insist on leaving it in the room from the start?_ she asked herself for the millionth time. _And why did he get so upset later when I finally came to my senses?_

After the way he'd left her place after their conversation, she had felt a little trepidation when she went to work the next day—how would this affect their working relationship? Part of her was relieved when he treated her in the same efficient manner the other team COs treated their 2ICs. She tried to tell herself that she didn't miss the special closeness that they'd had before, and that this had been what she'd wanted all along.

She barely had time to dwell on it before they were on their way to Russia. Though she didn't say anything, she felt just as aggravated that the Russians had a running Stargate as the Colonel did, though for a completely different reason. She'd never admit to it, but it pricked her professional pride that they'd managed to get a dialing system up and running in just a few short months when it had taken her two years of mind-numbing work.

It was on the flight to Siberia that she realized leaving it in the room would be even harder than she'd anticipated. He was being his usual cantankerous self, and Dr. Markov looked to her, clearly hoping for a sympathetic eye roll. "Is he always like this?" she asked.

Sam had looked at her Colonel and back at the Russian doctor, barely managing to bite back an indulgent grin. "Actually, this is quite charming," she told her.

She had wanted to bite her tongue off as soon as the words were out of her mouth. "Quite charming" were not words used to describe your boss. Your boyfriend could be "quite charming," and possibly even family members, but never a commanding officer. From the sudden speculative glint in Dr. Markov's eyes, the slip had not gone unnoticed.

That wasn't what disturbed her most though. That moment came later in the mission, when she was about to go through the 'gate in the mini-sub with Dr. Markov and Daniel. He was standing off to one side watching them climb in, and she happened to glance over at him just before she dropped out of sight. The look on his face said everything they weren't allowing themselves to say—this might very well be the last time they saw each other. If they couldn't turn the probe off and shut down the outgoing wormhole, there would be no way to return.

The hidden fear she saw in his eyes was exactly what she was trying to prevent by putting their feelings back in the room. If they could close themselves off again, regain the professional distance they'd lost long ago, then they could avoid the inevitable pain if one of them didn't make it back from a mission.

_And now it's happening again, only this time I'm the one left behind._

Before she could dwell any longer on the past, she was quite literally shaken out of her ruminations. She looked through the window, but saw nothing that could have caused the sensation she felt. She waited a moment, and it came again. "Vibration," she said, speaking for the first time since they'd entered deep space.

Her father looked over at her, clearly surprised that she was talking at last. "No kidding." He grimaced, and she knew that whatever was happening wasn't good. "We're at 132 of maximum speed. If we don't shake apart, we just might get there."

She closed her eyes momentarily in relief. She'd done the math earlier; even at full speed, there was no way they could get to the Colonel and Teal'c before their air ran out, but if they pushed the engines…

Selmak's unique dual vibrato brought her back to the present. "You did not know of the recall mechanism?"

The pointed question brought back the wave of emotion she'd felt when Colonel O'Neill had first informed them of the true nature of the problem. "_We have lost control of the craft…"_ She'd been counting on them being able to do something in order for the slingshot maneuver to work. That had been the first time the rug had been yanked out from under her. That it had all happened because they'd missed the recall device…

"Well apparently Apophis didn't need a recall device until Teal'c planted the seeds of rebellion on Chulak. We didn't have a clue." She knew she sounded defensive, but she didn't care. She had helped design the X-301, she should have found the recall device. She knew this was her own fault, but she didn't need to be reminded of that by either the Tok'ra or her father.

Selmak nodded slightly. "The devices are new, even to the Tok'ra."

Indignation flashed through her. "You could have told us!" The thought that if they had, two of her friends wouldn't be floating in deep space hung in the air as clearly as if she'd yelled it.

"You could have told us of your intentions," Selmak countered. For the first time, she hated how pragmatic the Tok'ra always were.

"Uh yes… Why didn't we?" Daniel asked.

Jacob snorted, and she knew it was her father speaking again. "Same reason we didn't. Politics. So, how do you intend to get them out of the glider once we get there? I mean, there's no chance it'll fit in the cargo bay."

She and Daniel glanced at each other nervously. "We were hoping you could kinda… um, like… beam them out," he said.

"Beam them out? What am I, Scotty?"

Sam had been thinking about this, and she thought she had the answer. "I have an idea, Dad. But Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c are going to have to take a leap of faith." The two men looked at her expectantly, and she took a deep breath and continued. "We can't ring them aboard while they're in the glider, but if we can get them out of it—"

"I thought getting them out of it was the problem," Daniel interrupted.

She leaned forward slightly in her seat, and her enthusiasm for science dulled the fear of losing him—_losing them_—though it did not vanquish it completely. "They need to blow the canopy and push themselves away from the glider. If they can get five meters away from the cockpit, we should be able to get them with the rings."

Daniel frowned. "Push themselves away from the glider? We're trying to save them from dying in the cold of space, not help the process along."

"Sam's right, Daniel. It should only take a second for them to drift far enough away from the glider for the ring device to work. If they take a deep breath of pure oxygen before they blow the canopy, they should make it." Jacob and Sam shared a look, neither of them mentioning the assumption they'd just made—that O'Neill and Teal'c would still have oxygen left by the time they got there.

The knots in her gut tightened again, but she ignored it. _They'll be alive when we get there. We haven't come this far to bring home their bodies,_ she told herself.

Daniel still looked skeptical, but another, stronger round of vibrations halted any questions he might have asked. "What's wrong?" Sam looked up at the hull of the ship, wincing slightly at the distinctive screech of metal against metal.

Jacob kept his attention focused on where they were going, but she could see the tension around his eyes. "Nothing's wrong. Not yet."

"But there will be something wrong?" Daniel asked before she could.

"Well, let's just say I'd like to stop for a second and make some repairs, but this is not a particularly safe part of town to pull over."

"Oh." The subtext was clear: the ship was not doing well, and they were in the middle of Goa'uld occupied territory. They stared together at outer space. Suddenly, it looked much less benign than it had a moment ago.

"And what were you thinking anyway? Retrofitting a death glider? You should have known better. The technology you're screwing around with is way over your head!"

Even though she was a grown woman, her father's words still had the ability to rankle her more than anything else. "That is the most arrogant…. I can't believe that just came out of your mouth!" _We're trying to better ourselves, to move forward… Not too long ago you would have said we weren't being aggressive enough!_

"Well, it's the truth."

The flat tone he used, completely cutting off any argument from her, made her even angrier. "You of all people should know!"

He cut her off before she could work up to a full rant." I am uniquely qualified to know just how technologically infantile the human race is."

"Infantile?!" Suddenly she appreciated how Colonel O'Neill had felt when the Tollan had called them primitive. She wasn't sure if infantile was better or worse.

"Yes, in comparison with the Goa'uld and Tok'ra, you're very young."

She refused to acknowledge the truth of that statement. "You… you are so…"

"There's nothing wrong with being young, but you've got to learn to take small steps. You can't just slap a US Air Force sticker on the side of a death glider and call it yours. Advancement like that has to be earned."

She opened and closed her mouth soundlessly a few times before Daniel cut in with a rebuttal.

"Um, aren't the Goa'uld, and the Tok'ra, for that matter, uh…where they are by stealing the technology from other races?"

"Yes!" _Thank you, Daniel!_

"Yes, but the Tok'ra were flying around in ships like these when most of the people on earth thought it was flat."

Sam started to argue, but muffled explosions from the engine room cut the argument short. "What's that?"

Jacob grimaced. "What I was afraid of. We've overtaxed the drives."

An alarm beeped and warned them of a proximity alert. "Are we still in a bad part of town?" Daniel asked.

"The worst. We can probably get the drives back online, but it's going to take a few minutes."

A few minutes didn't sound too bad. They'd still have a chance of getting to the stranded glider before their air ran out. She ran calculations in her mind, pondering all the various ways they could recalibrate the engines to handle the extra strain.

She was mentally re-routing the power in the hyperspace drive when Daniel's unnaturally high-pitched voice caught her attention. "Excuse me? Is that what I think it is?"

She glanced out the window and felt the all-too-familiar sensation of the rug being yanked out from under her. Two Ha'tak vessels were staring back at her, bigger than life. "Can we cloak the ship?

"No. All main power systems are off-line." He looked at Daniel then back at the ships. "Can you speak with a Goa'uld dialect?"

"The dialect, yes."

Jacob understood the implication that Daniel didn't exactly sound like a Goa'uld. "That's all you need. When they try to make contact with you, place your hand here, and just use your imagination. Take your hand away, and it'll broadcast. Sam can you give me a hand?"

She walked with him into the engine room and wrinkled her nose slightly at the smell. Even the eco-friendly energy crystals gave off an acrid odor when they burned out. "Where do you keep the extra crystals?" she asked while he opened the panel. She opened the compartment he pointed at and stared at the crystals inside, the plan in her mind starting to take shape.

"Dad, I've got an idea." He looked up from the panel, a frown on his face. "Look, we both know what the oxygen capacity is in one of those gliders, and we know how long they've been out here."

He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I know Sam, I've done the math, but this is just a scout ship. It can't go much faster than it already is—or was, before I blew the engine."

"I think it can." He raised an eyebrow but gestured for her to go on. "If we re-route some of the power converters and switch this relay, we should be able to boost power to the engines by 50, without running the risk of overtaxing the drives again." She could see the refusal forming in his eyes, and she hurriedly continued before he could cut her off. "I would require a little bit of work on the power core, but I can do it."

He looked at her for a long moment before nodding. "Can you do it in five minutes?" he asked.

She grinned then, the first real smile she'd given all day. "Give me four," she said, and he laughed.

"Do it. I'll go rescue Daniel from himself."

Sam grabbed a handful of the crystals and headed opened the panel that revealed the ship's power core. Despite the recriminations she'd received from her father, she was almost as familiar with Goa'uld and Tok'ra technology as she was human. The changes she'd suggested weren't difficult, and she knew the only reason they hadn't been made before was a lack of necessity.

With her head bent over the panel and her hands quickly putting the crystals into place, Sam felt more like herself than she had all day. If Jack—_Colonel O'Neill_—was missing, she needed to be doing something to bring him home. Somewhere out in space, Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c were floating, waiting for her to rescue them.

_You've already failed at that once, Major,_ her subconscious taunted her. _What makes you think this will work any better?_

She winced. There were no words to describe how she'd felt when she'd looked at the course chart and realized that their attempts to slingshot the glider around Jupiter had failed. "We have no joy on the burn," she'd told them, feeling her throat close around the words. No joy… perhaps words could describe how she'd felt.

"Sam!"

Her father's voice shook her out of her morose contemplation. "Almost there!" she reassured him.

"We've got to go!"

She stepped back and took one last look at her work. _As good as it's gonna get. _"Punch it!" An instant later she felt the deck shift slightly under her feet and she knew it had worked.

The adrenaline that had been coursing through her suddenly evaporated, leaving her feeling worn out and emotional. Rather than going back to the peltak, where she was sure to be asked questions, she sank against the wall and slid down until she was seated on the floor. With her eyes closed, she tried to regain control of the emotions raging through her.

She heard footsteps approach and then stop in front of her. "What do you need, Daniel?" she asked without opening her eyes.

"Just thought I'd keep you company," he said.

She cracked one eye open to look at him and sighed when she saw his determined expression. "Have a seat," she acquiesced.

He sat down on the deck, awkwardly trying to cross his legs under him. Finally he gave up and leaned against the wall next to her, his legs stretched out in front of him. "So what exactly did you do to the engines?" he asked.

"I re-routed the power supply so we could get more speed out of them. We should get to Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c in just three hours now, instead of the five it would have been before."

"Well that's good."

"Yeah."

There was an awkward pause, and then he said, "So… I've been meaning to talk to you."

"Really?" She traced patterns with her fingers on the grey hull plating beneath her.

"Yeah, I was thinking, we've been through a lot lately and maybe… Sam, are you listening?"

Her fingers stopped and she looked at him guiltily. "I'm sorry Daniel, I just can't stop thinking about…" She waved in the vague direction of outer space.

He smiled sympathetically. "I know, that's why I thought maybe…" He paused again and then looked at her. "You haven't had a chance to talk to anyone about what happened on P3R-118, have you?"

The hand that had been drawing figures on the floor clenched into a fist. "What are you talking about?" she asked warily. That was the planet where their memories had been altered, where she had been Thera and Colonel O'Neill had been Jonah, where Thera and Jonah…

"Sam, I'm not blind. I could see there was something going on between you and Jack."

"Between Thera and Jonah," she corrected fiercely.

He cocked an eyebrow at that. "Thera was you, Sam."

"No she wasn't! She did things I wouldn't… I'd never…"

"Only because you won't let yourself," he countered, and she snapped her mouth shut and looked away. "Sam, what's stopping you? And don't tell me it's just the regs, because there are ways around that, if you were interested."

_I'm afraid that if I want anything too much, it'll mean I'll never have it._ The words almost flew out of her mouth before she stopped them. Instead, she stared stubbornly straight ahead, not saying a word.

Beside her, Daniel sighed. "Fine. I guess I just thought that if anything would make you see reason, it would be this, seeing how easy it could be to lose him."

This time, the words couldn't be held in. "Daniel, I can't do it! This just proves exactly what I was afraid of—our work is dangerous, every time we go through the gate we might not come back. If he died..."

"Do you really think it would be any easier to lose him even if you're not in a relationship?" He waited for a moment but she didn't answer. "Sam, I lost my wife. Does that hurt? Yes. Something inside of me died with her. But I would never, ever give up the time we had together, even knowing how it was going to end."

Sam didn't argue with that; she couldn't. Daniel knew more about losing people he lo… cared about than anyone she knew but Colonel O'Neill. If he said all the pain was worth it, maybe…

"Look Sam, I'm just saying you should think about it, all right? And maybe talk to Jack again. Don't shut yourself off from him just to avoid getting hurt."

"I'll think about it," she promised, her mouth dry.

The ship shuddered slightly, and she knew they were in their solar system. "Come on, let's get the guys home." She stood up and walked back into the peltak, grateful to put the conversation behind her.

Saturn filled the view screen, and its rings had never looked more beautiful to Sam. "How much longer till we reach them?" she asked.

"Five minutes, give or take. Why don't you give them a call, let them know we're almost there?"

Sam had the mike keyed on before he'd finished the sentence. "Digger One, this is Carter. Do you read?" She waited a moment, anxious to hear the Colonel's sarcastic voice filling the scout ship. When she heard nothing, she tried again. "Digger One, this is Carter. We're just the other side of Saturn from you, hang on."

She stared at the gas giant, unease churning in her stomach again. "Can't we go any faster?"

"The sub-light engines will only go so fast, Sam. Besides, if they're already gone—"

"They are not dead," she cut in furiously. "We did not come all this way…" She stopped and pulled herself back together. "I'm going to let the SGC know we're here."

Jacob nodded and she turned the radio on again. "Flight, Digger Two. We are in the solar system, and preparing for retrieval. We estimate our time to station keep with Digger One is four minutes. Stand by. We're trying to contact with Digger One, Sir, so far without success."

The words were sour in her mouth, but she refused to let it show. The thought that even after all the work they'd done to get here, they might be too late to rescue him—_them_—killed her, and she knew that Daniel was right. Losing him now when they had barely done more than acknowledge their feelings would hurt just as much as it would if they were together… maybe even more, since she wouldn't just be losing him, she'd be losing the possibility of more, someday.

She tucked that realization away to consider later when the glider came into sight. The engines slowed until only their inertia carried them forward, and then stopped altogether when they were mere feet away. She could see both Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c unconscious in the cockpit, and she clamped down ruthlessly on the panic she felt.

"Digger One, this is Carter. Do you read?"

An endless minute went by and neither of them moved. "Are we too late?" Jacob asked.

But Sam had seen something he hadn't—a slight twitch of a finger, a sign on life. "I think they're unconscious."

"Well, we have to wake them up somehow," Daniel said.

All her frustrations poured out of her. The thought that they'd come this far for nothing mixed with the fear that she'd made some major realizations about their relationship too late. "Dammit, Colonel! We haven't come all this way to take you home in a box, now wake up!" she shouted, not caring if her words gave away more than she wanted to.

Still, they didn't move. Her father had one more idea to wake them up. "Let me give them a nudge." He nosed the scout ship closer and bumped into the glider.

She saw him move and tried the radio one more time. "Colonel O'Neill?"

His head swiveled to look at them, and her heart clenched when she saw the glazed over look in his eyes. "Always knew angels looked like Carter," he muttered.

Daniel's cough sounded suspiciously like a covered up laugh. "Now we know Jack's hallucinating," he said. "He thinks he's in heaven."

"Colonel O'Neill," she repeated, instilling a bit of authority in her voice this time, "it's time to go."

"Can't go yet," he insisted. "Carter's coming to save us… Carter always saves us."

Her face went bright red, but she didn't have time to be embarrassed. "That's right, Sir. We're here to rescue you."

He blinked. "Carter?" He looked around and then back at her. "Carter?"

"Yes sir!"

He gave her a dopey grin that told her he still wasn't completely with it. "Thought you were…" He giggled, and she couldn't help but laugh with him. "Thought you were an angel." She blushed again when he stared at her. "You are an angel," he whispered, and then giggled again.

Now both Daniel and Jacob were laughing openly, but she ignored them. "We're going to find a way to get you back home safe and warm. What's your reserve oxygen status?"

"Uh… I don't… what?"

"What's your reserve oxygen status?" she repeated, forcing herself to remain patient.

He blinked again. "Carter, is that you?"

She took a deep breath. "Sir, we're over here ready to bring you home. But you're going to have to trust me." She looked over at her companions. "He's suffering from hypoxia, oxygen deprivation. Do you trust me, Sir?" she asked O'Neill, trying to keep him focused.

"Sure!"

"Good! Is Teal'c conscious?"

"Teal'c?" he questioned. There was no response from the front of the cockpit, so he threw a piece of metal at the helmet in front on him. "Teal'c!"

"O'Neill?"

"Look, it's Carter!" he said, waving at the scout ship. "She wants to talk to you."

Teal'c looked over at her, and she was relieved to see that his eyes were clearer than O'Neill's. "Major Carter. Little oxygen remains."

"Cabin pressure?"

"Also very low."

"We copy that," she said, suppressing the chill that crawled down her spine. If they'd been much later… "So we want you do exactly what we say. First, remove your restraints. Then on my mark, blow the canopy of the glider and push off."

"We will die!" he protested.

"Negative! It'll be all right if it's only for a few seconds."

She could see he remained unsure, but her father stepped in to explain it to him. "Teal'c, the only way we can bring you aboard is with the ring transporter. That means you have to be clear of the glider. You got it?"

"I understand."

"Good. I need you at least five meters from the scout ship, close together. Stand by until I get into position."

"Jacob, is that you?" O'Neill said, rejoining the conversation.

"Yes, it is Jack. Now do what we tell you."

"Do you know your ship is bigger than ours?"

Sam answered him, hoping her voice would bring him back on topic. "Colonel, we need you to concentrate."

He shook his head slightly. "Blow the canopy."

"On my mark, not before," she cautioned. Normally she wouldn't have to tell him that, but after everything that had gone wrong today, she wasn't taking any chances.

"Right!"

She motioned for Daniel to go into the hold so he could help them when they were brought aboard, and then gave a few last minute instructions. "Make sure your helmets are secure and set your oxygen at 100. You'll need to pre-breathe the last of it in deep breaths, holding each one in. You'll need to power the system before you blow the canopy. Then disconnect the umbilical and exhale as much as possible. Stand by!"

There were a few breathless moments as they positioned themselves above the glider. She hated not being able to see him, but she knew that if all went well, he'd be aboard and safe soon.

"We're in position," Jacob said. "Stand by in the hold."

"Colonel, Teal'c? Are you ready?"

"Ready!" His answer was much clearer now, and she knew the oxygen had done its work.

"Three… two… one… mark!"

A second later, she heard the sound of the rings being activated. She turned around to look at the hold, feeling her fingers cross of their own volition. She let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding when both men appeared in the cargo hold and collapsed to the floor. Daniel knelt between them and felt their pulses, then looked back at her. "They're all right!"

Sam wanted to join them, but one thing remained. "Flight, this is Digger Two. We have Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c aboard! They're both alive."

Her work done, she put the mike down and went into the hold. "Welcome aboard!"

She started to reach for him, but he turned to Daniel instead and allowed him to help him to his feet. "Hey… Jacob. Thanks for stopping by."

Her father's voice, so close behind her, startled her. "What the hell? I was in the neighborhood! Ya need a lift home?"

"Yes, Sir. Thank you."

Sam was content to just stare at him, almost unable to believe that he was really there. She watched him lean against the wall and slide back down to a sitting position and waited for him to look over at her. His eyes were glued to the floor though, and finally she realized he was avoiding her.

"Sir?" She scooted over next to him.

He glanced over at her and then back at the floor. "Hey Carter. I guess I ought to apologize…"

Now she was really confused. "What for? If anything, I should be apologizing to you. We should have found the recall device when we were working on the prototype. If I'd done my job right…"

His eyes met hers then and he frowned at her. "Don't," he ordered. "Don't even think of taking the blame for this. This did not happen because of you, it happened because Apophis is a miserable bastard."

"Yes sir," she said, smiling a bit. "I'm still confused though, why are you apologizing?"

He looked away again. "For what I said before," he muttered. "About you being an angel. I shouldn't have… if I'd been more aware… I didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable."

She stared at the back of his head for several seconds before she got it. He'd given away more than he'd wanted to, certainly more than he thought she'd accept from him. _And he doesn't know…_

There was only one thing for it. She reached out and touched his arm and then waited to speak until he was looking at her. "You didn't make me uncomfortable."

She saw the moment he realized what she was saying. "Yeah?" he asked, a grin already starting at the corners of his mouth.

"Yeah," she repeated, feeling her own lips curving up. She still had no idea what they were going to do next, but she knew one thing. Daniel was right; this made the whole day worth it.

**Disclaimer: **_Stargate: SG-1_ and its characters do not belong to me. I make no money off this story.


	6. Chapter 6

Title: Fork in the Road

**Title**: _Fork in the Road_

**Author**: Chocolatequeen

**Rating**: K+

**Summary**: AU Sam/Jack. "For every possible universe, there are an infinite number of variations, diverging at every choice we make like forks in a road." _AlterSam, Point of View._ After their confessions in Divide and Conquer, an alternate Sam and Jack do not leave their feelings in the room. How does that one decision change their universe?

**Dedication:** To Claudia, for answering the incessant questions about the fraternization regs, and to my beta, who's been amazing.

**Chapter Six: New Beginnings**

Jack tapped the briefing table impatiently. SG-1 was scheduled to go on a mission the following day, and with Daniel out for bereavement, they were waiting to hear who their fourth member would be. He didn't really want anyone else, and he personally thought this would be a great opportunity to give them all the leave they deserved. However, after what had happened the last time they'd tried to take leave, suggesting it didn't seem like a good idea. _One minute I'm trying to convince Carter to go fishing with me, and then next I'm talking to Thor._

Carter. His fingers stopped tapping momentarily and he looked over at her. They still had some unfinished business, but things hadn't exactly gone well the last time they'd tried to talk. He still wasn't sure their conversation in the scout ship wasn't just a product of his hypoxia induced euphoria. He'd certainly been imagining similar situations before he and Teal'c were rescued.

His ponderings halted when General Hammond entered the room. He and his team stood at attention until he said, "As you were."

They sat back down, and then he asked the question they were all wondering. "So General. Who's getting assigned to SG-1?"

"No one," Hammond said. "I've decided to reschedule your next mission until Dr. Jackson returns. You're all long overdue for some personal leave."

He went completely still for a moment—had his CO read his mind? "Yes sir. But the leaving part has been the problem."

Hammond smiled. "Oh, I think you'll make it to the front door before we realize we can't do without you. Dismissed."

"Thank you sir." The general left the room, and Jack switched his attention to Carter. She was smiling about something, he didn't know what. Frankly, he didn't care. Anything that made Carter smile like that was a good thing.

There was an idea forming in the back of his mind. They had leave, and there was no question what he was going to do with it. It had been far too long since he'd made it up to the cabin. Carter had indicated she wanted to talk. Maybe he should ask if she wanted to come with him… His imagination spun into overdrive, filled with pictures of him and Carter sitting on the dock, both of them casting lines into his pond. In the wilds of Minnesota, there'd be no one to interrupt them, no desperate plea to save the universe to force them to put their conversation on hold.

"Do you wish to spend your leave in the briefing room, O'Neill?"

Teal'c question pulled him back to the present. A quick glance around told him Carter was already gone. He knew exactly where she was going, so he got up to follow her. "No T, I've got plans. You?"

"I have plans as well. I have long wished for an extended period of solitude in which to engage in deep kel' no' rim."

"Sounds exciting."

"Indeed."

"So I'll see you next week, Teal'c." Jack was out the door and in the elevator before he could answer.

He watched the numbers change as the elevator carried him up, one hand bouncing against his thigh. The car moved slowly—too slowly. It gave him time to think. Halfway between levels 24 and 23, he started wondering if he was making a mistake. _Why on earth would a gorgeous, brilliant woman like Carter who has her whole career ahead of her want to saddle herself with an old, scarred airman like me?_

His finger hovered over the stop button, but various things he'd seen in the last six months held him back. Carter telling Anise that she cared about him too. Carter looking at him with wide eyes right before he kissed her. Carter, as Thera, leaning in to kiss him once again. Thera telling him that she was afraid to allow herself to care about him because it would hurt too much to lose him. Carter smiling at him when he thought his delusional ramblings had ruined their friendship, telling him that maybe it had done the opposite. And finally, over all, Carter looking at him through a force shield, accepting his wordless avowal of love and answering with one of her own.

When the doors opened at level 19, all his doubts were tucked back into the corner of his mind. He walked resolutely to her lab and then leaned against the open doorframe, simply enjoying watching her for a moment without her knowing it before he got her attention.

"Hey Carter."

She looked up sharply. "Sir! I didn't hear you come in."

"Yeah, you left your door open." He came in and shut it behind him. "Listen, I was thinking… you have plans for this week?"

She shrugged. "I have a few projects I could work on, but nothing major. Why?"

There was something in her tone, in the way she raised one eyebrow just slightly… "Just wondering if you're finally ready to take me up on that fishing trip."

She grinned, and he realized that she'd been waiting for him to ask. "Yeah sure ya betcha!" she said, and nervous anticipation built in his gut.

"Great. It'll take some time to pack and get the tickets lined up, so why don't I meet you on the surface in two hours?"

"Sure. Just let me drop these results off with Dr. Lee and I'll be ready to go."

Warning bells went off in Jack's head. If he let her near one of the other labs, he'd never get her off base, much less all the way to Minnesota. "Why don't you let me do that?" he said, smoothly taking the file out of her hand. "You've got packin' to do."

Two hours later, he was walking to the elevator with a duffle slung over his shoulder when he spotted Carter and Hammond coming from the opposite direction. His pace slowed slightly. _Hammond? She didn't tell him… _He inspected his CO's expression discretely but saw no hint that the man knew what they were up to. He let out a quick sigh of relief. He wasn't planning to keep it from him, but he wanted a chance to talk things over with her before they told General Hammond anything.

"Hey Carter, you ready to go? By this time tomorrow, we'll be sitting on the dock with our feet propped up, sippin' a cold one, and casting for that ever elusive…crappie."

She couldn't quite hide the smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. "Sounds great, Sir."

She got in the elevator behind him and he turned to Hammond. "Just so we're clear on this, Sir. It's going to be me, Carter, and the great outdoors. That means no cell phones, no fax machines, not another living soul for miles. We'll be unavailable, inaccessible."

"Incommunicado."

"Minnesota, sir," he corrected, tongue-in-cheek.

Hammond couldn't hide a smile. "I stand corrected."

With one last wary glance at him, Jack stepped into the elevator where Carter waited. He pushed the button that would take them up. "If there's an emergency back at the base, you better plan ahead and tell me now. If Thor needs me, he's going to have to beam me up! If the Tok'ra, forget it!"

SJSJSJSJSJSJSJ

Daniel threw his pencil down and stared at the jar. He had the whole paragraph translated, with the exception of one phrase that was giving him problems. Without really realizing it, he pulled his phone out and dialed Sam's office. She could get Teal'c on the phone for him so he could finish this.

When she didn't answer, he frowned at his phone. _Who else could I call?_ There was Jack of course, but he was never in his office to answer his phone. Janet might be able to help him, but then again, she might also be in the middle of a medical emergency. Finally he dialed the only other direct line he had memorized.

"Hammond."

"General, it's Daniel Jackson. I tried calling Sam but no one answered her phone."

"I gave the rest of SG-1 personal leave, Dr. Jackson. Are you still in Chicago?"

Daniel sighed. He'd been counting on Teal'c's help with this jar. "Yes sir. I'm in the basement of a museum looking at what appears to be an Egyptian burial jar…"

"That doesn't seem unusual in a museum that specializes in Egyptian antiquities."

"No sir, I guess not. However, there's something here beside the usual hieroglyphs. There's a second set of markings. They're Goa'uld symbols."

"Goa'uld symbols?"

He grimaced. Hammond's Texas accent was always more pronounced when he sensed a threat. "Yes sir. I was hoping Teal'c could help me translate one of the symbols, but if they're on leave…"

"Teal'c stayed here at the SGC, Dr. Jackson. I'll have him call you as soon as possible."

"Actually, I managed to convince the museum to let me take the jar back to the SGC. I'll just show it to him when I get there later this afternoon."

"I don't think I have to tell you that if we're finding Goa'uld artifacts in an American museum, it's a cause for concern. Perhaps I ought to call Colonel O'Neill and Major Carter back in…"

"Where are Jack and Sam anyway?"

"They took off this morning for Jack's cabin. I'm sure if I called, they'd understand."

Daniel wasn't so sure. If Jack had managed to convince Sam to go off with him to Minnesota, they were probably having a pretty important conversation. "Ah, no I don't think that'll be necessary," he hastily countered. "We don't even know what this jar was yet, no reason to disturb their vacation."

"They should at least be informed, so they're aware something's going on here."

He could tell the general wasn't going to let this go, so he desperately threw out one last attempt. "I'll give them a call as soon as I talk to Teal'c. We'll know more then."

"Very well. I'm counting on you to figure this out, Dr. Jackson."

"Thank you, General." Daniel closed his phone, not realizing until a moment later that he'd just volunteered to interrupt Jack and Sam's private vacation.

SJSJSJSJSJSJSJ

The scene was exactly how he'd pictured it. They were sitting side by side on the dock, both lazily casting lines out into the pond. With each cast, he could feel Sam shoot a nervous look over at him, and he knew he was doing the same thing. The morning sunshine brightened into midday heat that finally faded into the lazy comfort of a late afternoon without a single word being said about why they were finally here together. The hours of idle chitchat tried his patience on multiple levels, but after what happened the last time he tried to talk to her, there was no way he was making the first move.

Finally, she shifted in her seat and he thought she might be ready to talk. "You know," she said casually, "as nice as this is, I didn't come here for the fishing."

"Really?" he asked noncommittally, keeping his eyes focused on his line.

"No, I didn't. Actually, sir—"

"Jack."

"What?"

He took his sunglasses off and looked over at her, all pretense gone. He knew **exactly** what they were talking about, and he wanted her to know he was one hundred percent serious. "We're fishing, Carter. Alone. In Minnesota. Drop the sirs." The implication was obvious: _I am not having this conversation as your CO._

He could see her trying to frame a response to that, and he was eager to hear what she came up with. He never got to. A shrill, unmistakable sound shattered the peaceful quiet of the pond. _Oh, she didn't!_ But she started guiltily and pulled a cell phone out of her pocket. She glanced down at the caller ID then back up at him, and he could see an apology forming on her lips. He looked back out at the water, trying to ignore how hurt he was. "Might as well answer it, Carter," he told her, cutting off whatever weak excuse she came up with. "After all, why else would you have brought the damn thing with you?"

"Hey Daniel." He could faintly hear the archaeologist say something about interrupting, and his ears perked up. If Carter took the out Daniel had given her, maybe... "No, Daniel. What did you need?"

Jack snorted and began reeling his line in with fast, jerky motions. Clearly, the trip to the cabin didn't mean as much to her as it meant to him. Well, if that was the case, there was only one way to make her happy. He stomped back up to the cabin, a single goal in mind. As soon as he was back inside, he went into his room and pulled his duffel out of the closet. Without bothering to fold things nicely, he shoved all of his clothes back into it and zipped it up.

Sam walked through the door just when he stormed through the living room. He tossed his bag down at her feet and moved on into the kitchen. They'd bought fresh food at the grocery store on their way through town, and there was no way he was going to let it rot in his fridge. The box they'd carried it in was still sitting on the floor, so he started dropping things into it, feeling a peculiar satisfaction in the loud thunks as the cans and bottles hit the floor.

He could feel her eyes on him, but he refused to look back at her. "What are you doing?" she asked.

"What's it look like I'm doing?" he snarled. "I'm packing."

"Why?"

_If that isn't the stupidest... _"You obviously don't want to be here, so I'll take you home so you can get back to your precious lab."

"What makes you think I don't want to be here?"

"Gee, let me think," he said, laying on the sarcasm thick. "Could it be the fact that you brought a phone with you, when I told even Hammond that we were going to be incommunicado? Or maybe it was the way you couldn't wait to pick it up, right when…" He stopped before he could finish the sentence: _Right when I thought we were getting someplace._ Instead, he said, "I thought this trip meant something. Apparently it didn't mean anything to you."

"I didn't want to bring the phone, and I definitely didn't want to answer it when it rang," she protested.

He slammed his hands down on the table. "Then why did you?"

"Because I was ordered to!" she hollered back. "When I told General Hammond I was coming up here with you, he insisted on having a way to contact us." He blinked. That was one possibility he hadn't considered. Some of his anger faded, but he could tell by the look in her eyes that she was just getting started.

"I told him I was hoping for a quiet week with no interruptions, but he made it very clear that the only way he'd let me come was if I brought my phone. _'I can't let half my best team go off without any way to call you back if I need you,'_ he said." She got up in his face and poked him in the chest. "There was nothing I wouldn't have done to come up here with you," she said in a harsh whisper. "Damn it Jack, don't you get it? I didn't bring the phone because the trip didn't mean anything; I brought it because it means everything."

His eyes widened. He'd promised himself after their adventures as Jonah and Thera that he'd get her to call him Jack, and now she had. That more than anything told him how seriously she took their relationship. _And I accused her of not caring..._

He ran a hand through his hair and looked away. "I'm sorry. I guess I was a little out of line."

"Maybe a little," she agreed, but he was relieved she no longer sounded angry. "I should have told you about the phone earlier though. Truthfully, I was hoping it would never ring."

He snorted. "Wishful thinking, Carter. You should know better than that by now—Earth can only last 24 hours without SG-1."

He only had a moment to wonder what the mischeivous look in her eyes meant before she spoke. "You know, _Jack,_ we're fishing. Alone. In Minnesota. Drop the Carters."

He raised an eyebrow. "Are you always this cheeky when you're off-duty?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out."

"Oh believe me, _Sam,_ that's not all I intend to find out… eventually." He let his gaze sweep from her head down to her toes, leaving no doubt what he was thinking about.

He grinned when she blushed, and then changed the subject. "But we've got some things to talk about before then. Why don't you get cleaned up while I fix dinner, and we can talk then?"

Her cheeks were still faintly tinged with pink. "Okay."

He watched as she turned around and left the room and then went to work. By the time she emerged from the bathroom, clean and smelling distractingly like fresh strawberries, he'd managed to put together a fairly edible meal of salad, potatoes, and just slightly charred steaks.

"I didn't realize you could cook."

"I can't. I am however capable of roasting animal flesh on an open flame."

She laughed then, and he was in heaven. "I see. Should I get your caveman club, sir?"

He raised an eyebrow, and she blushed again. "Sorry, habit."

He could tell her slip had made her uncomfortable, so he changed the topic easily. "Look, dinner is getting cold. Why don't we sit down and eat?"

"Sure. Did you need me to set the table?"

"Already done." She looked at the bare dining table and back at him. "We're eating on the deck. Here, you can carry the potatoes, and why don't you grab a couple beers on your way out?" With the meat in one hand and the salad in the other, he walked out onto the deck, Sam close behind him.

"Sit, eat!" he told her, pointing to the patio table.

"You were right, it's beautiful up here," she said as she sat down, looking out over the pond.

He looked at her then, taking in the way the tension lines around her eyes seemed to have melted away, and the easy smile she wore. "Yeah well, I like to think that's not all I'm right about."

"Really? Did you have anything particular in mind?"

He raised his bottle to his lips and smirked. "I knew you'd love it here."

She smiled back, but didn't say anything, instead taking a bite of her steak. He watched her eyes widen in pleasure. "I take back the caveman comment," she told him after she'd swallowed.

He waved away her compliment. "The secret's in the sauce."

For a few minutes, they were both quiet while they ate. Jack wasn't much of one for talking about… feelings, so he didn't mind the casual conversation they shared over their meal. Finally though, when there was nothing left on their plates but bones and scraps and they still hadn't gotten past comfortable conversation, Sam folded her napkin carefully and placed it on the table. "I think we need to talk."

He fiddled with his knife for a moment before answering. "Yeah, I guess we do."

She looked at him helplessly for a minute and then said, "I don't even know where to begin. It feels like we've had this conversation in bits and pieces before, and I just… where do we start?"

He shifted uncomfortably. Personal conversations were _so_ not his forte. But she was looking at him like she needed him to rescue her, and that look always got him. "I guess we start with the obvious…" He forced himself not to look away from her, wanting her to see the truth in his eyes. "I care about you Sam, a lot."

The only sign that she'd heard him was a slight easing of the tension in her shoulders. Her lack of response would have made him nervous if he hadn't recognized the expression on her face. It was her _I'm going to find the solution to this if it's the last thing I do_ look.

"What are we going to do?"

"That's kind of up to you, Sam."

She frowned. "I won't break the regs."

He was nodding before she finished the sentence. He'd known that from the start—she was a by the book officer, there was no way she'd do something as flagrant as breaking the frat regs.

She shifted restlessly in her seat, and he knew she was going to stand up before she did. He let her walk over to the deck railing without going after her, knowing she needed a little space. "I feel a little… conflicted. I want two mutually exclusive things."

"What's that?"

"SG-1 and you."

Something warm stole across Jack's chest, and he realized that until that moment, he hadn't believed this was real. He stared at her a moment, taking in the way she looked, her back to him and the last glow of the sunset reflecting on her golden hair. Now he felt like he could do what he'd wanted to do for ages. He got up and joined her by the railing and wrapped one arm around her, pulling her close.

He allowed himself the luxury of holding her before he spoke again. "We can always wait until I retire," he offered, though he privately thought of this as the last resort. He'd already waited a long time to be with her. Still… "My knees aren't going to last forever."

Instead of laughing at the joke like he expected, she stiffened slightly in his arms. "We are not waiting that long," she said, echoing his own thoughts.

"Well, there are some other options…"

He felt her shoulders droop slightly and wondered what she'd come up with. Whatever it was, she clearly wasn't enthusiastic about it. "I suppose I could always transfer to the scientific department."

Jack was shaking his head before she'd finished her sentence. "No. No way Sam. For one thing, you're too damn good at what you do. You belong on an SG team, not in a lab. For another thing, I'm not letting you sacrifice your career for me."

"It wouldn't have to be a hit," she protested. He pulled back just far enough so she could see the disbelief in his eyes. "Good. I didn't really want to do that anyway."

He rolled his eyes at her admission. "We're both missing an obvious option."

"What's that?"

"One of us moves to a different team." He felt her tilt her head back slightly, and without looking he knew that she was chewing on her lips while her mind went over all the angles of his suggestion. "I've been thinking about this for a while, and I this is the best answer I can come up with."

She shifted slightly against his shoulder and then he was looking her in the eye, or she was looking him in the eye, whatever. "When exactly have you been thinking about this?"

"Time loop machine? I had a lot of time to think, remember?"

He saw the speculative look in her eye, but she only gave him a minute to wonder what she was thinking before she asked. "Jack… about the time loops. The next morning, Daniel asked you if you'd been tempted to do anything crazy. I know you did something, I could tell by the way you were smiling. What was it?"

He wasn't sure he could answer her question without giving into the pressing urge to kiss her again, so instead he threw her own line back at her. "That's for me to know and you to find out."

A chilly wind blew up off the pond, and he abruptly realized that it was now almost completely dark. At the same time, he could feel Sam fight back a huge yawn. "We ought to turn in for the night, it was a long day. Before we do though, I want to make sure we're on the same page."

"I think so. When we get back, I'll tell General Hammond I'd like to be transferred to a different team."

"When we get back, _we'll_ tell the General the truth, and let him find the best solution," Jack corrected. "You never know, he might even want to transfer me instead." Now it was her turn to look at him disbelievingly. "All right, so that's not likely."

"We have to tell him the whole story?"

He shrugged. "We haven't broken any rules. If we want him to believe that, we need to be upfront with him."

"Fine." She yawned again. "I think I'm going to bed Jack, I'll see you in the morning."

"Night Sam."

"Night Jack." She looked at him for a long moment, and then brushed a quick kiss across his cheek. He watched, stunned, as she floated across the deck and back inside the cabin.

SJSJSJSJSJSJSJ

The day was identical to the one before: The same bright sunshine, same cool pond, same companion… Jack looked over at Sam and then down at where their hands were linked between the two chairs. _Well, maybe not identical._

Sam sighed, and he looked over at her again. "What?"

"I was just thinking… What if I hadn't agreed to come with you this time? Who knows how long it would have taken us to get here?"

"Yes well… Let's not dwell." It was something Jack had wondered himself, and he didn't like the possibilities he'd come up with. However… "What made you change your mind?"

"About what?'

He swung their joined hands a little. "This. Last time we talked, you weren't so enthusiastic."

She looked over at him and he could see a hint of a smile. "I thought we weren't going to dwell."

"Sa-aaaaaam!"

"Ja-aaaaaack!"

"C'mon Sam, tell me please."

She sighed again. "It was while you were…" She gestured vaguely toward the sky, and he looked at her blankly. "With Teal'c," she expounded.

"Ah."

"At first, I thought it just proved I was right to turn you away. You were lost in space and I… all I could think about was getting you home. I couldn't let myself contemplate failure, or I would have lost it completely. I told myself that it would have been worse if we'd been together…" She let the sentence dangle for a moment, and he remembered what Thera telling him she was afraid to care about him, because it would make it harder if she lost him.

"But then Daniel came to talk to me."

"For an archeologist, he's awfully nosy."

She snorted. "Yeah, but he was right. He told me that some things are worth taking a risk."

Before he could answer, a shrill ring pierced the air. After a moment of déjà vu, they looked at each other and laughed. Sam pulled the phone out of her pocket and handed it to Jack. "You answer it this time."

He took a quick glance at the caller id before picking up the call. "Speak of the devil…" he muttered. "Danny! We were just talking about you."

"You're fishing with Sam in Minnesota and you were talking about me? Okay, that's just disturbing Jack."

"I try. I assume you called for a reason?"

"Yeah… I'm afraid I've got some bad news."

He rolled his eyes. "Is there any other kind?"

"Not lately, it seems," Daniel agreed. "This isn't run-of-the mill bad though, this is… big bad."

"Spill, Daniel."

"That jar held the preserved remains of a Goa'uld symbiote. Apparently, it was used as some kind of… banishment container. The jar was filled with a liquid that essentially put the Goa'uld it contained to sleep."

"And that's bad how? It sounds like a good way to take care of the snakes if you ask me."

"That's not the bad part, Jack. The symbiote was only dead because the seal on the jar was broken in transport. Now, according to the manifest, there were two jars. I can't find the other one. If the seal on it is intact…"

"Then there's a live Goa'uld running around Chicago somewhere," Jack finished grimly.

"Exactly."

"Any possibility it's still safe in its little snake prison, wherever it is?"

"I don't think so. Some strange things have been happening around here… There have already been two deaths, possibly three if Dr. Jordan's wasn't an accident."

There was a brief pause, and Jack looked over at Sam, who'd been listening carefully to the one side of the conversation she could hear. He gestured back up to the cabin and mouthed, _Pack._ He watched her walk back inside before turning back to Daniel. "Daniel? Whatcha got?"

"I think I know who it is, Jack, but I can't be sure. I'm going back to the SGC on the next flight, and Hammond's putting a trace on my suspect. Hopefully he'll have something by the time I get there."

"By the time we get there," Jack corrected.

"What? No, Jack you don't need to—"

"Danny. I'm not letting half my team go after a Goa'uld without me. Sam and I will be on the next transport into Peterson."

"Sam?"

He heard the smile in his friend's voice and chose to ignore it. "We'll see you on base, Daniel." Before he could be asked any embarrassing questions, he snapped the phone shut.

SJSJSJSJSJSJSJ

Jack tapped the briefing room table impatiently, unaware that his teammates were sharing exasperated looks. Finally, Teal'c reached out and stopped his fingers forcefully. "I must ask you to desist, O'Neill."

He glanced around and saw they were all glaring at him. "Sorry. But weren't we just here yesterday?"

Daniel raised one finger. "I wasn't."

"Okay, you have a point. But the rest of us were. We were here, and we were promised leave. I'm starting to think there's a conspiracy."

"A conspiracy, sir?" He thought she might be mocking him, but she was smiling so he really didn't care.

He gestured broadly. "Yeah, a galactic conspiracy."

"A galactic conspiracy to make sure we never get time off?"

Jack glared at Daniel. "No need to be sarcastic, Daniel."

Both Daniel's eyebrows went up. "Hello Pot. I'm Kettle—you're black."

Before he could retort, he heard something that sounded suspiciously like a smothered laugh come from Sam. _Carter! Work—Carter. Home—Sam._ "Something funny, Major?"

She shrugged apologetically. "You have to admit sir; it's a bit of a reach to think that a Goa'uld who had been sedated for thousands of years actively plotted his return to foil with our leave plans."

"About that. Care to explain exactly how this Goa'uld managed to get loose, Daniel?"

"I'm interested in hearing the answer to that too," General Hammond said as he entered the room.

Jack quickly stood to attention, along with the rest of his team. "General, good to see you."

"Hello Jack, thanks for coming back. Dr. Jackson, I believe you have some things to tell us?"

"Yes… As you're all aware, one of the artifacts Dr. Jordan was working on just prior to his death was a canopic jar that we now know held the petrified remains of a Goa'uld. Based on the inscriptions on the outside of the jar, I'm assuming her identity was Isis. Now, there was a second jar—the Osiris jar—which is missing. Also missing is Steven Rayner, who had been assisting Dr. Jordan in studying the artifacts. According to Sarah, his apartment was completely cleaned out."

Hammond nodded slowly. "So you believe this Steven Rayner has been taken over by a Goa'uld?"

"Well, it makes sense."

"I've just got one question, Daniel," Jack said. "How do we find him?"

Daniel picked up the remote from the table in front of him, and Jack turned his attention to the screen at the end of the room. "Right now, this is our only lead. It's the amulet that was stolen from Dr. Jordan's office. Now, by Earth standards, it's a priceless relic, but I'm assuming that a Goa'uld isn't interested in it's monetary value, so…"

"Then why take it?" Carter asked.

Daniel looked up at the screen, a frown on his face. "That's a good question. It's a pretty standard representation of Osiris. He's carrying a crook and flail, which are the scepters of kingship, and in the center is an ankh, which represents immortality."

"Could be some sort of Goa'uld device," Hammond speculated.

"It's possible," Daniel agreed, though his voice clearly said he doubted it.

"That might explain why it was the only item taken," Carter suggested.

"Well, I checked the other artifacts for naquada, which is usually… Teal'c?"

Teal'c had risen from his seat beside Jack and approached the screen. He tilted his head slightly and studied the picture of the amulet carefully. "General Hammond is correct." He turned back to face them. "This is indeed a Goa'uld device."

"You've seen one of these before, T?"

"Indeed I have, O'Neill. Apophis carried something very much like it."

"So what is it?"

"Many Goa'uld maintain a small ship hidden in a secret location so they can escape in the event of attack. This is the key that will reveal its hiding place."

"Sounds like a Goa'uld," Jack said. "Only concerned about his own neck." Teal'c inclined his head in agreement.

"So assuming what Teal'c said is right, he could have a ship hidden away so he can get off the planet," Carter said.

"General, I think SG-1 would like to go after his slimy snake butt."

"Agreed, Colonel. However, before you go I'd like you to talk to Dr. Frasier. She's come up with something that might help you. That's why I've asked her to join us. Doctor?" he said, turning toward the door.

"Thank you General." Dr. Frasier entered the briefing room, and Jack noticed she had a large syringe in her left hand. He winced instinctively before realizing whatever it was probably wasn't for him.

"I managed to synthesize the liquid from the jar, so on its own it should act as a powerful sedative. One dart should be more than enough to knock out an adult Goa'uld."

"Do we really want this thing alive?" Carter asked.

Jack gestured between himself and Carter. "Now see, I was just going to say that. C'mon, General, every time we try to take one of these guys alive, it backfires on us."

Daniel was the first to answer. "Well, even though it's been in stasis for the last several thousand years, it could still be a valuable source of information."

But Hammond was shaking his head. "I want you to hold that option in reserve. Your first priority is to stop the Goa'uld with minimum risk to yourselves."

"Thank you!"

Walter stuck his head in the door. "Excuse me sir, there's a phone call for you."

Hammond picked up the nearest phone. "Hammond. Yes. All right, thank you."

He stared at the phone for a minute after hanging up, and then looked back at SG-1. "We got a lead on Steven Rayner. He boarded a flight to Cairo four hours ago."

"He could be headed back to the temple in Egypt where the jars were first discovered," Daniel supposed. "If he does have a ship hidden somewhere, my guess is that's where it is. If we move fast, we could head him off, sir."

Hammond nodded slowly. "I can alert the Egyptian authorities, but this needs to be a low-profile operation. Dr. Frasier will accompany you, as she understands her sedative better than anyone. You'll fly out of Peterson in an hour. Dismissed."

SJSJSJSJSJSJSJ

Jack stared at Daniel's out-stretched hand. "You've got to be kidding me."

"Well, unless you've spent years working on remote desert digs, I'm the one with the most experience."

"It's a Jeep! How much experience do you need?"

"I believe we are wasting any lead we may have gained arguing. Give Daniel Jackson the keys, O'Neill."

He huffed, but did as he was told. Once they hit the desert road, he was glad he had. It was hard enough to stay in his seat; staying on the road had to be even harder. "I think I know why this place doesn't get any tourists," he quipped.

"Not quite the easy drive you'd imagined, is it," Daniel goaded.

"Hey, I've driven across deserts before… just, you know… in a Humvee." He grimaced when they flew over another dune. "Are we there yet?"

"According to the GPS, we've still got almost ten miles," Carter said.

"Great. Well, since we have time, why don't you tell us a little more about this dart thingy you came up with, Doc?"

"Yes sir. Each dart tip is laced with enough sedative to take down a Goa'uld. Your best bet will be to shoot him in either the chest or the neck."

"Won't shooting him in the neck make him bleed out?" Daniel asked.

"No, it's got a fine point. That shouldn't be a problem unless you actually pierce the artery."

Jack had one more question. "Okay, so what do we do if it doesn't work?" His teammates looked at him blankly. "I'm serious. Every time we think we've got the perfect weapon to use against these guys, something goes wrong. We ought to start thinking about that now, rather than let ourselves be surprised at the wrong moment."

"Too late," Daniel lifted one finger from the steering wheel to point at the truck barely visible on the horizon. "We're almost there."

They instantly quieted into pre-mission mode. As they approached the temple, Jack's eyes were roving the landscape, looking for any signs of what they'd find inside. He was the first out of the Jeep when they stopped, running to cover the entrance while Teal'c readied the dart gun.

Once they were prepared, he nodded to the rest of his team and they quickly moved into the temple, checking for any signs of the Goa'uld along the way. They didn't have to look far. There was a man lying on the floor near an altar who he could only assume was Steven. Daniel's cry of, "It's Steven!" confirmed it.

He looked at Carter and nodded. She was the one who could tell if Steven was actually a Goa'uld, or if they'd just come to Egypt on a wild… snake chase. She held her weapon ready as she approached him, but relaxed her hold on it a moment later. "I'm not sensing anything. He's not Goa'uld."

He gestured to the doc, and she rushed to the prostrate man. "He's bleeding internally."

He and Teal'c shared a look. "If he's not the Goa'uld, you can bet whoever is did this to him," Jack said darkly. "Teal'c, take Daniel and search the rest of the temple."

"There is no rest of the temple, Jack. This is it." Jack gestured for Teal'c to search the shadows anyway.

"Steven, why did you come here?"

He groaned. "I figured out the amulet was a key. There's a hidden chamber. I wanted to make the discovery."

"Daniel, if there's no place for the Goa'uld to be hiding, then we're trapped in here the moment he figures out where here. We've got to get out of here."

"Steven, who did this to you?"

Steven didn't answer, but someone else did. "I did." The voice was unmistakably Goa'uld, and also unmistakably female. It wasn't one he recognized, but he could tell from the way Daniel's hand clenched on his side arm that he did.

"Sarah?"

She started to answer, then stopped and looked down at her chest in surprise. Teal'c had come out from behind the pillars and shot her with a dart. "What is this?" she demanded. "What have you done?"

_Isn't she supposed to be asleep right about now?_ "Doc?"

"You… will pay…" Osiris passed out on the floor before she could finish her threat. He pulled the ribbon device off her right wrist and then secured her arms behind her back and bound her legs. He frisked her for hidden weapons and stopped when he felt something cold and hard against her ribcage. When he pulled it out, he recognized it as the amulet Daniel had talked about.

"So Teal'c. Why don't you find this ship so you can fly us home?"

"I cannot, O'Neill. To call the ship requires the use of the ribbon device."

Jack looked at Teal'c and then at Sam. "You do it then," he told her. He handed the amulet to her along with the ribbon device and watched Teal'c show her what to do.

She looked at him over her shoulder, he could see her hesitation. She hated using Goa'uld technology. "Are you sure about this, sir?"

"If we bring home a ship, we'll finally be able to tell Kinsey and everyone else that actually are achieving our mission of finding technology to aid our fight against the Goa'uld."

"Yes sir." She looked back at the altar and concentrated. A moment later, the ground began to shake. "Is it supposed to do that?" she asked Teal'c.

"The ship is rising to the surface." He went outside and shouted directions to her. "You are almost done Major Carter; a few more moments should suffice… Stop."

Carter's arm dropped to her side and her free hand pulled the ribbon device off. Behind her, Steven groaned again.

"How's he holding up?" he asked Frasier.

"If we get him out of here right now, I think he'll make it."

"Then you and Daniel load him up in the Jeep and take him back into the city. You can take the next transport back; we'll fly the ship home."

They nodded, and Daniel picked Steven up, following Frasier's careful instructions. "I guess we'd better make up a story to tell him," he muttered as they walked out of the temple.

"So I'm guessing there's a ring platform somewhere around here that'll get us right onto the ship, what do you think Teal'c?"

"That seems logical, O'Neill."

Carter walked over the floor slowly. "It's right here," she said. "Stand next to me." Jack and Teal'c looked at each other and then back at her. "Trust me." He shrugged and dragged Osiris into the center of the temple a moment before Teal'c joined them.

A minute later, the familiar sound of the rings filled the air, and then they were on the ship. "Now how did you do that?" he asked.

"The rings are made of naquada, sir."

"Of course they are. Teal'c, fire up this baby and get us home."

SJSJSJSJSJSJSJ

Osiris wasn't talking. For once, they had a Goa'uld captive, and she wouldn't give them the time of day. Even telling her that the Tok'ra were on their way to put her miserable self out of existence didn't coerce her into sharing. Jack stared into the brig, half wondering why they'd even bothered.

He heard coming up behind him and half-turned. "Hey Jack."

"Daniel, you're back! Come to visit our favorite prisoner?" He gestured at the door with his thumb.

Daniel peered through the window and winced, and Jack remembered that he knew Sarah personally. "Have the Tok'ra been called?"

"On their way."

He shifted his weight slightly. "Could I talk to her before they get here? I might… I know Sarah, after all."

"Be my guest, Danny. If you can get her to do anything beside spout curses at us all, I will…"

"Be careful what you promise Jack, I might hold you to it."

"Go talk to her."

Daniel walked inside, but Jack opted to watch from the window. "Hello."

"Daniel Jackson. You seem to know much of the Goa'uld, much more than any other human I have more than any other human I have encountered since my awakening."

"I've read up." Jack snorted at the understatement.

"Then you know that I was once worshipped by all of Egypt."

"Yeah? Well, times have changed."

"So I have observed. Where is my brother, Setesh?"

"You mean Seth? We killed him."

The cool calm in Daniel's voice got under Osiris' skin like nothing else had. "You lie!"

"No… No, we also killed Ra, and Hathor, and... oh, who else?" He rocked back on his heels, pretending to think. "Oh, Sokar!"

She had regained her composure however. "Then you have done me a great favor. I will rule without opposition."

"No, you won't actually. You see, the Tok'ra are on their way right now. They're going to remove you from your host, from the person you have trapped against her will."

Jack knocked on the window, but Daniel ignored him. Instead, he grabbed onto the bars and shoved his face into Osiris'. "What gives you the right to do that?" he demanded. "What makes you think you can just take over another being, someone with family, friends?"

_Time to put an end to this._ He threw the door open hard enough that it bounced off the wall. "Daniel!"

His friend didn't look at him. "I'm not through, Jack."

"Yes you are." Jack heard footsteps in the hallway and looked over his shoulder. "The Tok'ra are here. You can watch, if you want, but from the hallway. Is that clear?"

Daniel gave the Goa'uld one last long look and then turned around. "Yes."

"Good. I've got to go, Carter and I are meeting Hammond in," he looked at his watch, "five minutes."

Sam met him at the door to Hammond's office, as they'd agreed. "You ready for this?" he asked her in a low voice.

They were standing close enough for him to hear her take a deep breath before answering. "I don't think you can ever be ready to do something like this—"

"Listen Sam, we don't have to do this if you don't want to. It's not too late to change your mind."

"Let me finish," she told him, mild reproof evident in her tone. "I was going to say that while I don't think any amount of preparation would calm my nerves, it's definitely time."

"Yeah?"

"Knock on the door, Colonel."

Jack did, and a moment later Hammond responded with, "Enter."

He held the door while Sam went inside first and then followed her in and shut the door behind him. "Colonel O'Neill, Major Carter, what can I do for you?"

"We have something to tell you—Off the record, if possible."

Hammond looked at him carefully and then nodded. "All right. Jack, Sam, what's going on?"

Jack opened his mouth and then shut it. _Sam was right, nothing could possibly prepare me for this._ He cleared his throat and tried again. "Carter and I did some talking while we were in Minnesota, and we've decided… that is, we were wondering…"

Sam took over, her words clear and precise where his had been mumbled and garbled. "The Colonel and I would like to pursue a personal relationship, sir."

Jack kept his eyes on his commanding officer, who leaned back in his chair, a frown on his face. "You know the regulations better than anyone, Major."

Out of the corner of his eye, Jack saw her blush a little. "Yes sir. We haven't… that is…"

This was his territory. "Nothing's happened yet, General."

"But you'd like something to happen."

"Yes sir!" they said in unison, and he was gratified that she sounded just as emphatic as he did.

General Hammond picked up a pen and tapped it lightly on the desk a few times before looking at them again. "I can't say this is completely unexpected," he said, a hint of a smile on his face, "but I don't have a solution for you right now. I'm assuming you both want to remain at the SGC?"

"Yes sir!"

"All right. Give me some time to find an answer… You can wait a month or two, can't you?"

Hammond looked straight at Jack when he asked that question, and it was his turn to flush slightly. "I think so, sir," he answered with a smirk.

"Very well then. Since you came to me off the record and have assured me that nothing untoward has happened yet or will happen until you are no longer in the same chain of command, I'll let SG-1 continue to operate in its current configuration. If this changes for any reason, I expect you to let me know immediately, is that clear?"

"Yes sir."

"It may take a few months to find an appropriate solution," he said again, a look of warning on his face.

"We've already waited several years, sir. I don't think a few extra months will break us."

"I hope you're right, Jack. Dismissed."

They heard the familiar sound of the chevrons spinning when they left the office and by mutual agreement, they went to the command center. Daniel was there, watching as the Tok'ra went through the wormhole.

"Hey Daniel."

He didn't look at them, he didn't even blink. "Oh, hi Jack."

He and Carter looked at each other, then back at their friend. "So, was the operation successful?"

"Hmmm? Oh. Yeah, Sarah's resting in the infirmary now. She seems a little… she doesn't really want to see me right now."

"Ah."

"I can't really blame her; I mean, even if this wasn't my fault, I am the easiest person for her to blame… I just wish I could explain it all to her."

"She might feel differently in a few days," Carter offered.

"Yeah, maybe…" He stared at the Stargate for another moment and then visibly shook his melancholy off. "So, what were you talking to General Hammond about?"

They looked at each other again. "The future," he said, a faint smile on his face.


End file.
